‘No option’ for Palestinians, ‘but to fight for their rights’

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to Washington did not heal the rift with President Barack Obama over peacemaking with Palestinians or the Iranian nuclear agreement. But the two men met the press before a White House fireplace in order to project the notion that their encounter was businesslike if not amicable.

Ahead of Netanyahu’s visit, Obama had removed the second most vexing issue causing antagonism between the two men: negotiations over the “two-state solution” for the Israel-Palestine conflict.

Obama’s administration simply announced it would not put forward any new initiatives on this front in the final 15 months of Obama’s last term.

In payment, Netanyahu disingenuously reasserted his commitment to the “two-state solution”, knowing full well that during the March parliamentary election campaign he had announced if re-elected there would be no Palestinian state.

During their meeting, the question of US management of the adoption of the Iran nuclear agreement, the most vexing issue separating Netanyahu and Obama, was not mentioned. 

Stage managing the encounter did not, however, prevent Netanyahu from continuing to provoke Obama.

Last week, Netanyahu appointed right-wing journalist Ran Baratz as head of Israel’s “hasbara” — propaganda — campaign in the prime minister’s office. This appointment prompted the Israeli press to come up with some of Baratz’s insulting comments about the US leadership.

He suggested that Obama was the “modern face of anti-Semitism” and that Secretary of State John Kerry had a 12-year-old’s intellect. (His fault was, of course, persisting in efforts to secure a land-for-peace deal with the Palestinians, a proposition Israel refuses to discuss seriously).

Obama’s blunt defender, Vice President Joe Biden fired back: “There is no excuse, there should be no tolerance for any member or employee of the Israeli administration referring to the president... in derogatory terms. Period. Period. Period.”

During this term, Obama has had to put up with US-born and educated Israeli ambassador to Washington Ron Dermer who, in 2012, openly campaigned for Obama’s rival, Republican Party presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

Netanyahu’s appointment of Dermer was characterised by Peter Beinart, writing in Haaretz last February, as “arrogance”.

“Arrogance” appears to reflect Netanyahu’s attitude not only to the Obama administration, but also to Israel’s parliamentary opposition and Palestinians suffering under Israel’s unending, colonising occupation.

Beinart asked: “Why do Netanyahu and Dermer act [arrogantly]?”

And then replied: “Because they can. Because they pay no real political price.”

He pointed out that Netanyahu had a reputation for arrogance and insulting behaviour in dealings with three US administrations. George H.W. Bush’s secretary of state James Baker banned Netanyahu from the State Department.

Following his first meeting with Netanyahu, Bill Clinton is said to have screamed: “Who ... does he think he is? Who’s the... superpower here?”

In spite of Netanyahu’s behaviour and Israel’s policies, he and Israel have never had to pay a price for rudeness and defiance because he and Israel can count on a subservient Congress to back every demand.

According to The New York Times, Israel demands an increase in annual arms aid from $3 billion to $5 billion in compensation for its last minute abandonment of opposition to the Iran nuclear deal.

However, it is unlikely that the White House will agree, because Netanyahu continued his anti-Iran campaign until the bitter end. The amount might, however, reach as much as $4 billion.

Haaretz reported that US officials have finally admitted that the “two-state solution” is dead and are considering the “one state” option.

This is obviously very belated because it has been clear for years that the “two-state solution” — the repartition of Palestine — has been rendered impossible by Israel’s accelerated colony construction in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, where 550,000 illegal colonists were planted on land Palestinians need for their state.

The “one-state solution” is the worst possible option for Israel as the Palestinian population of the region between the Mediterranean and the Jordan river has already reached 6.2 million, narrowly exceeding the Jewish population.

At present, Israel has a population of 8.3 million, 6.1 million, or 75 per cent, Jewish; 1.7 million, or 20.7 per cent, Palestinian citizens of Israel; and around 350,000, or 4.3 per cent, “other”.

The Palestinian population in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, is 2.7 million and 1.8 million in Gaza. 

By withdrawing its army and colonists in 2005, Israel had hoped to remove the Gazans from the equation. But by maintaining remote control by land, sea and air over Gaza, Israel cannot claim the absence of Gazans in the calculation of populations.

Therefore, in addition to the “one-state solution”, the Palestinian majority has already been achieved.

Israel all too clearly plans to manage this situation by squeezing the Palestinians with the aim of forcing them to emigrate. This was the recommendation of Theodor Herzl, the founding father of the state.

However, Palestinians remain more than ever determined to stay put because they are well aware how stateless people are treated in today’s world.

Furthermore, states which might have taken in Palestinians living under Israeli occupation are overwhelmed by hundreds of thousands of refugees who fled the conflicts in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Africa.

Palestinians — except those fleeing Syria — have no place to go. This means Palestinians trapped by Israel have no option but to fight for their rights — either in the streets or on the international scene — against Israel’s subjugation of millions of them by the permanent occupation.