Israel Sees Hopeful Signs in Collapse of Peace Talks
Houses under construction at a Jewish settlement near Jerusalem on Wednesday.
By ISABEL KERSHNER
Published: December 8, 2010
JERUSALEM — Israel worked hard on Wednesday to make the failure of an American-brokered effort for a resumption of Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations sound like a success.
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U.S. Drops Bid to Sway Israel on Settlements (December 8, 2010)
Officials here insisted that Israel remained determined to try to achieve a historic peace agreement with thePalestinians and that coordination between the Israeli prime minister and the Americans has perhaps never been better.
But the optimism was one-sided as the peace process entered into a new deadlock. A day after the Obama administration said it had given up its effort to persuade Jerusalem to freeze construction in Jewish settlements for 90 days in return for an attractive package of security and diplomatic incentives, the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, said there was no doubt that the peace process was in “a difficult crisis.”
The Palestinians walked out of talks with the Israelis in late September after a previous 10-month moratorium on construction in the settlements expired. They said that they would not return as long as building was going on.
Mr. Abbas is now consulting with the Palestinian leadership and the Arab states, and was expected to hold talks with the Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, on Thursday.
Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, said on Wednesday that Israel was “responsible for the failure of the American effort.” But he stopped short of saying there would be no future talks without a settlement freeze.
“I am not saying anything,” he said by telephone from Cairo. “The call is not mine. The call is of the Palestinian leadership.”
Israeli officials said the Palestinians were at fault for setting preconditions for the talks, most recently their insistence that East Jerusalem be included in any freeze in settlement building.Senior aides to the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, took to the air waves to try to put a positive spin on the developments, emphasizing the closeness of American-Israeli coordination.
Ron Dermer, political adviser to Mr. Netanyahu, told Israel Radio that the Americans tried for 18 months “to go on a certain path, at the center of which was the request for the freeze.” On Tuesday, Mr. Dermer said, the United States “came to the conclusion that this path in the end was not bringing results.” Instead, Israel is now building a new route back to the talks together with the Americans, he said.
Uzi Arad, the National Security Adviser and a confidant of Mr. Netanyahu, told Army Radio that the Palestinian expectation for the borders of a future Palestinian state to be agreed upon in that 90-day period was unrealistic, and that the Americans realized that.
As part of the incentive package, Israel was expecting to get an additional 20 stealth war planes, beyond the 20 it had already ordered. Even though the settlement freeze deal is now off the table, the Israeli officials said the request for the extra F-35 planes still stood, so that the Israel military could maintain its qualitative edge.
“I don’t rule out the possibility that we will get the additional 20 planes,” Mr. Dermer said.
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