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Obama Chides Palestinians on a Crucial Issue

President Barack Obama’s historic speech today on the future of the so-called Arab Spring and Israel-Palestinian negotiations included several harsh words for both Israel and the Palestinian Authority, and in some instances backed the same policy employed by Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, who, instead of embracing the gesture, is now responding defiantly.

While Obama’s speech has garnered headlines for irking officials on both sides, where Obama is actually supporting Israel is quite substantial.

Two major roadblocks have been publicly touted as critical for the resumption of peace talks: Palestinians refusal to recognize Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state and Israel’s continued settlement construction. Obama said:

For the Palestinians, efforts to delegitimize Israel will end in failure.  Symbolic actions to isolate Israel at the United Nations in September won’t create an independent state. Palestinian leaders will not achieve peace or prosperity if Hamas insists on a path of terror and rejection.  And Palestinians will never realize their independence by denying the right of Israel to exist.

He continued:

How can one negotiate with a party that has shown itself unwilling to recognize your right to exist?  And in the weeks and months to come, Palestinian leaders will have to provide a credible answer to that question.

Obama’s statement that Israel has right to exist and criticism of the Palestinians for refusing to make that same claim puts the White House in a position largely parallel to that of Israel — the Palestinians must accept the legitimacy of Israel as a Jewish state.

While seemingly only words, this issue has a much larger philosophical significance that could emerge as central to Israel’s future. Israel exists as a state for the Jews in the Jewish homeland after hundreds of years of persecution where Jews were not safe or treated as equals. The creation of Israel provides the Jews with a place where they will not be persecuted and can always live in if the tides of anti-Semitism turn against them.

However, there are many non-Jews living in Israel. This non-Jewish population could, theoretically, demographically pose a threat to Israel if the percent of non-Jews climbs to constitute a major segment of society. While Israel is not on track for that demographic threat, birth patterns could shift or a slew of non-Jews could move into the country through the right-of-return, which is Palestinians claim that any non-Jew living in the land known today as Israel can return, even though many of the individuals chose to leave and were incentivized to leave by the surrounding Arab countries.

Recognizing Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state would be an admission that it is unfeasible to allow hundreds of thousands of non-Jews into Israel, where they could easily use the country’s democratic process to turn the country into a multinational state and not a Jewish one. Some versions of a right-to-return have been floated — such as a symbolic quota of Palestinians allowed to settle in the country — but the overall concept will never be agreed to by Israel because it threatens the very foundation of the state.

For that reason, Netanyahu has been insistent that the Palestinians accept Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state, as that declaration would an expression that Israel should not be wiped off the map in the future via a bi-national state.

The Palestinians have responded that Israel should characterize itself as it so chooses, and the Palestinian interpretation is irrelevant.

Obama’s chiding on this issue clearly articulates that the Palestinians have placed an unnecessary roadblock to peace, and that’s their insistence on not recognizing Israel’s right to exist.

 

Author

Ben Moscovitch

Ben Moscovitch is a Washington D.C.-based political reporter and has covered Congress, homeland security, and health care. He completed an intensive two-year Master's in Middle Eastern History program at Tel Aviv University, where he wrote his thesis on the roots of Palestinian democratic reforms. Ben graduated from Georgetown University with a BA in English Literature. He currently resides in Washington, D.C. Twitter follow: @benmoscovitch

Areas of Focus:
Middle East; Israel-Palestine; Politics

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