I have taken a lot of ribbing from my progressive friends for documenting how President Obama is governing just like Bush on many foreign policy matters.
This includes the way Obama has escalated drone attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan; notwithstanding reports that, for every 1 terrorist killed, these attacks kill 10 innocent civilians. But most disheartening for his liberal supporters is the way he has escalated the war in Afghanistan – unabashedly fashioning his new military strategy there on the surge strategy Bush deployed in Iraq.
(Incidentally, a cursory search of this weblog will reveal that I’m on record, as early as 2005, declaring my belief that the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq had become like the one in Vietnam: no longer winnable and, hence, no longer worth fighting….)
Now come reports that Obama is aping Bush’s strategy for brokering peace in the Middle East too. Here, for a little context, is how I ridiculed Bush’s declaration in January 2008 that there would be a peace treaty between the Israelis and Palestinians before the end of his presidency in January 2009:
When I criticized Bush back then for his Chamberlainian declaration, I had no idea that Israel would expose his pandering in such explosive fashion – as it did four days ago. But anyone remotely familiar with the geo-political tensions in the Middle East, and with the patent inability of U.S. presidents to affect them, knew full well that the chances of Bush pulling off an eleventh-hour peace treaty were zero to none.
Frankly, I knew it was only a matter of time before the Israelis and Palestinians reignited their warfare. And it hardly matters who or what triggered this latest episode – especially since the root cause of this perennial conflict dates back to Biblical times, and each side claims divine provenance for its actions.
(Bush’s promise of peace in Middle East…, The iPINIONS Journal, December 31, 2008)
Given this Bush precedent, not to mention the 60-year futility of Mideast peace initiatives, you’d think that Obama would be loath to make a similar declaration about brokering a peace deal within a year. Yet:
We believe these negotiations can be completed within one year… We will engage with perseverance and patience to try to bring them to a successful conclusion.
(Obama’s Special Envoy For Middle East Peace Senator George Mitchell, whitehouse.gov, August 31, 2010)
Then, of course, there are the obstacles posed by other looming issues:
On the one hand, Israel’s 10-month moratorium (aka a “slowdown”) on the building of Jewish settlements in the disputed territories (of the West Bank and east Jerusalem) ends on September 26. And no less a person than Israel’s foreign minister has vowed to adamantly oppose any attempt by Prime Minister Netanyahu to extend this moratorium to appease Obama and the Palestinians. Yet the Palestinians have vowed that there will be no talks, let alone peace, unless Netanyahu extends it … indefinitely.
On the other hand, the Islamist Palestinian group Hamas has vowed to accelerate terrorist attacks on Israel – even launching one last week to coincide with Obama’s declaration to reinforce its point. Yet the Israelis have vowed that there can be no peace as long as these attacks continue.
In point of fact, there’s no greater obstacle to the two-state solution Obama is attempting to broker than Hamas controlling the Gaza Strip, which must figure in any comprehensive and lasting peace. Do I hear a three-state solution…?
Frankly, these looming issues make it more likely that hostilities between the Israelis and Palestinians will be even greater in 12 months than they are today. Which beg the question: Why did Obama set this patently meaningless deadline? Especially since there’s zero chance that he will declare all hopes of brokering peace in the Middle East dead if, or when, he fails.
This is why it seems almost as foolhardy for him to put his presidential gravitas on the line in this fashion as it was for Bush to stake his presidential legacy on the getting Saddam and turning Iraq into an exemplary democracy. Mind you, this is not to say that he should not even bother. In fact, no matter how daunting the prospect, it behooves every U.S. president to extend his best efforts to broker peace in the Middle East….
That said, let me hasten to clarify that, even though I think setting this deadline was foolhardy, Obama’s failure to meet it will have no bearing on his reelection prospects in 2012. Not least because, as indicated above, you’d be hard-pressed to find daylight between Obama and any Republican contender on this or any other foreign policy matter.
So please ignore attempts by some Republicans to make an issue of the July 2011 deadline he set for pulling troops out of Afghanistan. After all, we all know that this date is about as meaningful as Obama’s September 2011 deadline for brokering peace in the Middle East.
More to the point, there will be peace not when Obama or any U.S. president decrees it, but when God (or Allah) divines it. And only God knows when that will be….
Related commentaries:
Bush’s promise of peace in Middle East
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