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Beyond "Evenhandedness"

[Forward] Abraham Foxman - There has been a lot of talk about the need for the Obama administration to engage on Israeli-Palestinian issues early and often. The primary purpose of such engagement should be to stabilize the situation and set the stage for an ultimate resolution of the conflict via a two-state solution. Two pitfalls, however, must be avoided. The first is the temptation to see the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as the key to solving all of America's problems in the Middle East. Adopting such a view would create unnecessary tensions between America and Israel. It would put too much weight on this specific issue and inevitably lead to demands that Israel be the party to make the greatest concessions. And it would not yield progress on the Israeli-Palestinian issue or on any of the other major challenges America faces in the region. Second, the administration must avoid taking what some refer to as an "evenhanded" approach. "Evenhandedness" fails to take into account the vast differences in the historic relationships the two sides have had with America, in the institutional characters of the two societies, in the meaning of democratic values in each and in their respective approaches to peace. Israel is an American ally in every sense of the word - strategically, morally and in terms of public attitudes. While the U.S. should help find a solution that serves the interests of both Israelis and Palestinians, there is no moral equivalence between the two sides. What, then, should American engagement focus on? It should, above all, provide an answer to what has increasingly become the accepted Israeli view that concessions to the Palestinians produce not moderation but greater extremism. How can Israel consider tangible concessions when all the evidence seems to be that concessions make Israel more vulnerable and lead to more Palestinian violence? Confidence-building measures for the Palestinians must be accompanied by American insistence on getting the Palestinian Authority to stop the teaching of hatred of Israel on television and in schools, to deal with terrorists in a more serious and consistent way, and to continue to develop responsible security forces. Final-status issues are resolvable only in the context of a process that fundamentally changes the dynamic with respect to the impact of Israeli withdrawals and concessions. Insisting that Palestinian leaders behave differently and providing mechanisms to reduce the ability of Hamas to make trouble are the best things engagement by the Obama administration can produce. The writer is national director of the Anti-Defamation League and the author of The Deadliest Lies: The Israel Lobby and the Myth of Jewish Control (Palgrave Macmillan, 2007).
2009-02-16 06:00:00
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