Scripps Howard News Service:
The Obama administration is having no better luck with Mideast peace talks than the Bush administration. Worse, actually.
Israeli governments ignored George W. Bush's demands for a freeze on settlements on the West Bank and in East Jerusalem, but at least they were relatively restrained about it.
Not so with Barack Obama, who appears to be regarded with great skepticism and suspicion in Israel. Vice President Joe Biden arrived in Israel Monday on a mission of reassurance, only to be greeted by the news that the government had approved a 112-unit expansion of an ultra-Orthodox settlement.
U.S. Mideast envoy George Mitchell had just announced that the Israelis and Palestinians had agreed to ``indirect" talks, with the U.S. shuttling between the two sides. This seems like a weak substitute for direct negotiations, but considering that there have been no talks at all for the past 14 months, this agreement perhaps constitutes modest progress.
On Tuesday, Biden had a series of meetings, described as ``warm," with Israeli leaders in which he described the U.S.-Israel bond as ``unshakable" and assured the leaders, "There is absolutely no space between the United States and Israel in terms of Israel's security. None."
He emerged from those meetings to find that the hard-line, right-wing minister of the Interior had OK'd the construction of 1,600 new homes for Israelis in East Jerusalem, which the Palestinians hope to claim as the capital of an independent Palestine.
The announcement was seen as a slap in the face to Biden, a warning to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu against any concessions to the U.S. and perhaps an attempt to torpedo even the indirect talks.
Certainly, the Palestinian Authority took it that way. The PA threatened to call off the talks and its chief negotiator, Saeb Erekat, called the announcement ``part of a systematic policy to destroy the peace process."
Earlier, Erekat had told Israeli Army Radio that the indirect talks were the last chance for a two-state solution, the goal of successive U.S. administrations. Failing that, Erekat said, the Israelis and Palestinians would have no choice but to share a single state ― the last outcome the Israelis want.
Even given Biden's legendary loquacity, it will be tough for him to talk his way out of this one.