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Examining the Options for Mideast Peace

(Ha'aretz) Shlomo Avineri - Before Obama was elected, the conventional wisdom pinned the lack of a peace agreement in the region on the unwillingness of President George W. Bush to apply pressure on Israel. But now we see that even an activist president like Obama, with firm views on the nature of such an agreement and without excessive fondness for the Israeli prime minister, cannot even get the negotiations to the starting block. For 17 years Israel and the Palestinians have been trying to reach a final agreement, either directly or with U.S. mediation. The gaps, it turns out, are too great. So the U.S. must abandon its fruitless efforts to obtain a final agreement in favor of examining the option of interim agreements or partial, perhaps even unilateral, measures. The writer, professor of political science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, served as director-general of Israel's Foreign Ministry.
2010-12-20 08:31:00
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