Land Swaps Predetermine Negotiations, and set yet Another Precondition

Over the past week or so we've been privy to a number of new developments in President Obama's efforts to convince Palestinians to rejoin negotiations, which they have been refusing to do now for more than two years.

In President Obama's big policy speech on May 19th, for the first time in history, he unilaterally decided that negotiations will take place on the basis of '67 lines with land swaps.' And while he insists that everybody knows that the 'basis of 67 lines' has been the White House position since apparently time immemorial, the truth of the matter is that even if it was an assumption by many, it was not official American Administration policy, and the moment it was made so, involves a number of presuppositions.

Even after President Obama's "clarification" at the AIPAC 2011 conference, the fact of the matter is that President Obama has adopted a position, and is trying to force it upon Israel, in that all land that Israel acquired as the result of its defensive wars until 1967 fighting off Arab attackers, actually belongs to the Palestinian people, and that any new borders that are drawn in which Israel is granted territory beyond these borders, must involve Israel giving up an equal amount of territory to the Palestinian state.

And as opposed to what President Obama states about '67 borders' having always been the guiding criteria for the American Administration, even if it was unspoken. The assumption that Israel would have to give up territory as part of negotiations with the Palestinians as part of a land swap has never existed. And in spite of the fact that the world wants to ignore it, there has never in the history of the world been a sovereign state of Palestine. And the territory of the West Bank and Gaza Strip were part of the Ottoman Empire, then taken over by Egypt and Jordan after the creation of Israel and the Arab states rejection of the UN's 1947 partition plan.

And while yes, Israel gets it that those refugees like all other peoples in the world have the right to self-determination in their own land, the amount of land is what is disputed by the Israelis (as opposed to among most in the Palestinian camp who dispute the right of Israel to exist at all). Another fact that most people ignore is that the main conflict at play is the Arab Israeli conflict, and the Palestinian refugees are a result of that conflict, not the cause.

The Arab nations, including the Palestinian people, have waged war after offensive war against the Israeli state, and lost. And in conflict, those that wage offensive wars and lose pay a price. As a result, it is quite unacceptable that the President now decides it is his right to foist upon the State of Israel not only '67 lines, a stance which he softened in his speech to AIPAC, it is unacceptable that he presupposes Israel must exchange an equal amount of land (land swaps), as part of an agreement to retain blocks of land it has built on since the '67 war.

And by doing so, he is not only trying to predetermine the outcome of negotiations, he is once again giving away a critical Israeli bargaining chip. One which could be used to extract important concessions from the Palestinians, for example, getting them to agree there will be no Palestinian right of return within Israeli borders, with nothing in return.

Every time President Obama stands in front of the world and adds on new preconditions to negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians, he is shooting himself in the foot, and reducing any chance that negotiations shall restart.

There are those that say that negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians must be between two equal parties. And that is also wrong. Much like negotiations between the Americans and Germans after WWII were not between two equal parties. The party that won the war had much more power, and that which waged it on an offensive basis, AND LOST, had less. The Palestinians, being an active part in the rejection of partition and the offensive war against Israel in 1948 indicates to us the status of the parties. Subsequently, President Obama bringing the full weight of the United States down upon Israel to level the playing field for the Palestinians (or tip it to their advantage in this case) is wrong, unfair and injust. Not only that, but it encourages further Arab intransigence and their use of force.

Security is Israel’s primary concern, but justice is another. And constantly being unfairly pressured into making unilateral concession after unilateral concession as the result of a misguided policy to make peace at all costs is not acceptable.