How predictable that just as Middle East Peace talk between the Palestinians and Israel are set to get underway, Israel announce plans to build 1,400 new homes in Jewish settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, territory the Palestinians claim for their state.
Predictable because this is what Israel do every time there is mention of talking peace and even the most rose-tinted Israel admirer in the White House must see the humiliating pattern for American policymakers.
In 2010, the Vice President Joe Biden was in Israel and spent his time assuring Israel of America's unconditional support and talking up the prospects of a renewed peace effort and Israel announced the construction of 1,600 new homes for Jews in the disputed territories of East Jerusalem.
In the summer Israel kicked more sand in the face of the Obama Administration by announcing further settlements days after Kerry announced a push for peace in the area and then again, a day after Kerry has left the region after working on the Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas, to drop his earlier demand for a settlement freeze before negotiations, Israel's housing ministry announces that 800 new houses would be built in the West Bank and 600 in East Jerusalem.
Why America continues to entertain Israel is bizarre, in future years the modern day Israel will be mentioned in the same breath as the apartheid regime in South Africa and America will have found itself tainted with its closeness to another unfriendly nation.
Despite the continual embarrassments, America continues to fund Israels military and Israel is happy to throw spanners into the works whenever the chance of peace talks is raised so it can continue with the status quo while it mops up Palestinian land.
This Israeli Government doesn't want peace, it has no intention of halting settlement construction until it has written its smaller neighbour out of the equation.
I don't have much hope that the US administration now to hold Israel to account for actively sabotaging their efforts for peace time and again, but they should by withholding their funding and forcing them to make peace or keep going as they are and face bankruptcy.
2 comments:
you really don't know why we entertain Israel?
how about:
- we had a hand in creating it
- America has many wealthy Jews involved in politics
- America has a large Jewish population
- America has a small Muslim population
- if we didn't ally with Israel we would ally with who?
- while it may be 1920 mentality the middle east is strategically placed for traditional, boots on the ground, military action in Europe, Asia, and Africa
- Jews ignore Christians, but much of Islam despise Christianity
- what did I forget?
q
You forgot the obvious, the massive religious voting block in the USA who blindly support Israel and ignore their many wrongs. If any politician has aspirations of becoming President, he or she HAS to play to this crowd.
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