Secretary of State John Kerry has been made to look foolish by the Palestinian Authority. On Friday, Kerry announced that there would be negotiations on moving forward with peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians. It was not actual peace talks being announced, but rather talks about talking again. Even so, Kerry's announcement carried the implication that the barriers to those talks resuming had been basically resolved. Then yesterday, the Palestinians announced that they had not dropped their demand that they would talk to Israel only if the Israelis first agreed that the so called 1967 borders were the starting point for the talks. This is a non-starter for Israel and the Palestinians know it. In other words, the Palestinians were announcing in advance that the negotiations that Kerry had just announced would not and could not succeed.
This mess can be laid in the lap of president Obama. In one of his foreign policy flubs, he once said that the talks should from the 1967 borders. He later took that back when was explained to him why that would never work. It didn't matter. Once the president had said it, the Palestinian Authority could not take less without looking weak to other Palestinians.
Just to be clear, starting with the 1967 borders means Israel is conceding that it will give up the old city of Jerusalem which contains the holiest sites of Judaism (and Christianity) as well as the homes of hundreds of thousands of Jewish citizens. Not many countries around the world would agree to peace talks in which they first agreed to cede a big chunk of their capital city. Somehow, Obama missed that.
This mess can be laid in the lap of president Obama. In one of his foreign policy flubs, he once said that the talks should from the 1967 borders. He later took that back when was explained to him why that would never work. It didn't matter. Once the president had said it, the Palestinian Authority could not take less without looking weak to other Palestinians.
Just to be clear, starting with the 1967 borders means Israel is conceding that it will give up the old city of Jerusalem which contains the holiest sites of Judaism (and Christianity) as well as the homes of hundreds of thousands of Jewish citizens. Not many countries around the world would agree to peace talks in which they first agreed to cede a big chunk of their capital city. Somehow, Obama missed that.
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