Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: Bibi is right, Obama is wrong

http://www.thejc.com/comment-and-debate/columnists/29853/bibi-right-obama-wrong
Is the row over the east Jerusalem building project a ruse to bring 
Israel to heel?
By Geoffrey Alderman, March 25, 2010
Three weeks ago, the American vice-President Joe Biden visited Israel in 
order to kick-start what were termed "proximity talks." What this odd 
phrase really means is that, rather than pressure PA President Mahmoud 
Abbas to talk face-to-face with Bibi Netanyahu, Mr Biden hopes to act as 
the go-between. He will talk to one side, and then to the other. And so 
on and so forth. Whether this is a sensible way of going about 
peacemaking is a pertinent question, but it is not one that concerns me 
at the moment.
What caught the media's attention was that, no sooner had Biden arrived 
in Israel than the Israeli government - or at least someone in an 
official position in Israel - announced (to quote CNN) "new settlement 
construction in disputed territory in east Jerusalem".
Mr Biden, apparently without making any effort to get at the truth 
behind the announcement, lost no time in condemning it as "a step that 
undermines the trust we need right now".
Not to be outdone, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton went further. "The 
announcement of the settlements the very day that the vice President was 
there was insulting," she thundered, adding that even if Mr Netanyahu 
personally knew nothing in advance about the announcement, he was 
"ultimately responsible".
This was the sort of decision that UK and US planning authorities make 
on a routine basis
Well, as a matter of procedural fact, Mr Netanyahu bore no 
responsibility whatever for the announcement. The project in question - 
the building of 1,600 homes for Charedi Jews in Jerusalem's northern 
Ramat Shlomo neighbourhood - has been in the pipeline for the past three 
years.
All that happened three weeks ago was that the Jerusalem district 
planning committee approved the proposal and gave formal notice that 
members of the public had 60 days in which to lodge objections to it.
In other words, this was the sort of town-hall decision that planning 
authorities in the UK - and "zoning" authorities in the USA - make on a 
routine basis: approve a proposal purely for the purposes of public 
consultation.
We might also note that when, last November, Netanyahu announced a 
10-month freeze on construction for Jews in Judea and Samaria, he 
specifically and explicitly excluded Jerusalem.
So the Ramat Shlomo project is not new, neither does it violate the 
November 2009 undertaking, which extended only to the West Bank, nor 
does Netanyahu bear responsibility for it. The so-called "crisis" in 
relations between Washington and Jerusalem was, in fact, entirely 
manufactured.
Why? One school of thought argues that the Obama administration wished 
to use it so as to force Netanyahu to re-open the matter of the legal 
status of Jerusalem, which he (in common with previous Israeli Prime 
Ministers) regards as closed. Others insist that Obama's real and 
ultimate purpose is to destabilise the Netanyahu administration, and so 
force its collapse and replacement by a regime more willing to dance to 
Washington's tune.
These explanations are not mutually exclusive and could well reflect a 
yet deeper purpose, namely to signal to the Muslim world that Israel is 
no longer the USA's favourite child, and that a fundamental shift in 
American foreign policy is under way. I am not (yet) a member of this 
alarmist camp. But I admit that some of the signs point in its 
direction. I am especially perturbed by an incident that took place 
barely 48 hours after Biden's return to the USA, and which received 
little media coverage in the UK.
On Thursday March 11, a ceremony took place in the town of El Birah, 
near Ramallah. Students from the youth wing of Mr Abbas's Fatah party 
gathered to dedicate a public square to one Dalal Mughrabi. At the 
ceremony, Fatah officials described the late Ms Mughrabi as a 
"courageous fighter" and a role model. For those of you who need 
reminding, on March 11 1978, Fatah member Dalal Mughrabi led a raiding 
party that landed from Lebanon on the Israeli coast. In the ensuing 
mayhem, 38 Jews were murdered and another 71 wounded.
Now a square has been named in her honour. Has Joe Biden condemned the 
naming ceremony? Did Mrs Clinton publicly categorise it as "insulting?" 
Of course not. And that is precisely what worries me most.


Quoto.
-- 
Tb (bieco illuminista)

la sayeret sta prendendo la strada di Masada.