At Politial Animal, Samuel Knight makes a good argument a propos of Secretary of State John Kerry's renewed push for a resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict:
Obama might be right that “there’s no point to negotiations if the expectation is that everything must be figured out in advance,” as the AP reported. But it’s hard for one party to negotiate when its counterpart refuses to stop — even temporarily — actively encroaching on its territory. Unless President Obama was able to privately convince Benjamin Netanyahu to agree to a settlement freeze — recent criticism Obama offered in public has been very mild, that he doesn’t consider the settlements to be “constructive” — and was able to convey that to Abbas, it doesn’t seem likely that the talks will go anywhere. In other words, Kerry is wasting his time.
This is right, I think. And it needs to be said more frequently in the United States, particularly with regard to the situation on the West Bank. Gaza is it's own, mostly separate, issue. But in the West Bank the key problem with the peace process is the contining construction and expansion of the settlements. Knight goes on to quote an Amnesty International official:
The villagers say that the expanding Israeli settlement of Halamish has blocked their access to a nearby source of water, a spring. For holding weekly protests against this settlement, they have suffered greatly at the hands of the Israeli Defense Forces.
Israeli military law imposed in the occupied West Bank places sweeping and arbitrary restrictions on freedom of expression and assembly. This makes any unauthorized peaceful protest by Palestinians a criminal offence. Palestinians engaging in such protests face arrest and excessive force from the Israeli military on a regular basis.Authorities keep wanting to treat the settlements as though they are extraneous to peace. They're not; they're essential. Until they are removed, no peace is possible.
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