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Palestine Papers: 99 Percent Hype, 1 Percent News

(Commentary) Noah Pollak - The reality of the "Palestine Papers" - the leaked transcripts of late Bush administration negotiations between Israeli, Palestinian, and American officials - turns out to be incredibly boring. Yes, during the months surrounding the Annapolis summit in 2008, there were negotiations. Yes, in private, the Palestinians acknowledged that the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem is not going to be handed over to them, and that Israel will not consent to being flooded with millions of Arab refugees. No, the talks did not succeed. This is news? The papers show that one of the only areas on which the sides had come close to an agreement was the acceptability of land swaps as a solution to the settlements controversy. Today, at Obama's behest, the Palestinians insist on a complete settlement freeze before they'll even talk - including in areas that just two years ago they had agreed were already de facto Israeli. Thus did Obama turn back the clock on one of the only points of relative consensus and progress between the two sides.
2011-01-24 08:51:36
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