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Obama Envoy Tells Israel US Wants Palestinian State
JERUSALEM - U.S. President Barack Obama's Middle East envoy told Israel's ultranationalist foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, on Thursday that Washington wants to see the creation of a Palestinian state.
U.S. President Barack Obama's Middle East envoy George Mitchell (L) shakes hands with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas during their meeting in the West Bank city of Ramallah April 17, 2009. (REUTERS/Fadi Arouri) "I reiterated to the foreign minister that U.S. policy favours, with respect to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a two-state solution which will have a Palestinian state living in peace alongside the Jewish state of Israel," envoy George Mitchell told reporters, with Lieberman at his side.
"We look forward also to efforts to achieving comprehensive peace throughout the region," Mitchell said.
Lieberman has rejected restarting statehood negotiations with the Palestinians that were launched by then-U.S. President George W. Bush at a conference in Annapolis, Maryland in 2007.
In his comments to reporters, Lieberman made no mention of a Palestinian state, an issue that could put Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's right-leaning government on a collision course with Obama.
"It was a great opportunity to exchange some ideas, and we spoke about really close cooperation," Lieberman said about his meeting with Mitchell.
Mitchell, a former U.S. senator who mediated in the Northern Ireland peace process, planned to hold talks later in the day with Netanyahu and see Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Friday.
Netanyahu has so far refused to commit himself to the establishment of a Palestinian state in the occupied West Bank and in the Gaza Strip.
He has said he wants to focus any future peace negotiations with the Palestinians on economic and security matters, rather than thorny issues such as statehood borders, and the future of Jerusalem and Palestinian refugees.
Mitchell said that Lieberman told him about Israel's desire to "make economic improvements" in the West Bank.
Palestinian leaders have rejected any notion of an "economic peace" and have said U.S.-backed talks with Israel could not resume until Netanyahu committed to statehood.
Mitchell is on his first visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories since Netanyahu's government was inaugurated on March 31.
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36 Comments so far
Show AllScrew the two state "solution." I want the no state solution.
There will be no peace until no group has a monopoly on violence, period.
FYI, a recent inteview of Joel Kovel, an advocate of the one-state solution who recently lost his job at Bard College for speaking out about the Zionist project:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGkV1s7T1eA
http://www.codz.org
Joel Kovel and Norman Finkelstein should be seen as shining examples to the American Jewish Community. By merely researching and pointing out the lies, they have endured death threats and fired from their jobs. Academic freedon? Only for John Yoo types.
gringo, this issue is not one of Zionism (or any other single -ism for that matter) but of EMPIRE in any of its manifold disguises.
We're actually all "stooges" to the ruling-elite 'corporate financial Empire' that has captured almost full control of our country behind the facade of its two-party, 'Vichy' sham of democracy --- and supported by the Empire's equally 'Vichy' media.
I would argue that this disguised and hidden ruling-elite Empire is the proximate cause of all our 'sorrows' (domestic, economic, and foreign policy) as Chalmers Johnson noted in his fabulously honest book, "Sorrows of Empire" --- or as Hannah Arendt presciently warned in the era of the Nazi Empire, “Empire abroad (always) entails tyranny at home.”
AIPAC (or as I refer to it: American-style Imperialism Political Addiction Committee) is not the only, nor likely the biggest, problem regarding our government not acting in our own interests. AIPAC does not represent the interests of the vast majority of anti-war, pro-peace, progressive/liberal, and compassionate American AND Israeli citizens --- but represents only arrogant, and ultimately unsustainable Empire (here and there).
If Ms. Clinton were to be constructively honest, she might say something like "the path of Empire is never good for any country or people; my own country and people or yours", and to start candidly counseling what the most famous Jewish intellectual on Empire, Hannah Arendt said, or what our most famous American Jewish intellectual, Noam Chomsky has to say about the deadly, and ultimately existential, path of empire (both domestically and internationally) leading to imperialist wars, ruined economies, and tyrannized citizens.
But Ms. Clinton, I know Ralph Nader. And you, madam, are no Ralph Nader. You would need more honesty and courage to address the evils of Empire, as he does --- or to even dare to whisper its name. And while the vote is still to be recorded in history books, it's looking more and more likely that your boss may well have the courage and conviction to address the empire problem --- as he has started to do with the imperial looting of our 'commonwealth' heading for UBS's secret vaults.
The problem, at heart, is that we are all precisely in the same kitchen (and the very same small world) with that unmentioned elephant, Empire, and none dare speak the truth of our pathology, our tumor, our metastasizing cancer. And so we beat around the bush (like poor George) and just "go along to get along" with Empire. But the truth is, there is no "getting along" with empire-thinking --- it must, like a cancer, be diagnosed, treated, and often excised.
It’s hard to imagine, in this very modern 21st century, that we are still looking toward the end of the last of tribal ‘empire-thinking’.
We are a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, multi-racial, even post-racial, sectarian, mixing-pot-world of democracies on a small fragile planet --- and yet, we are still not beyond the danger of existential death at the hands of ancient and irrelevant tribal ‘empire-thinking’.
As only Kurt Vonnegut’s sense of ironic black humor might envision, “It is as if the whole human race was about to sit down to a celebratory picnic for successfully reaching our 21st century, when we are all unexpectedly killed by one remaining giant dinosaur.”
The last people in the world who should want to stay in (or ever promote) a world of tribalism, are the Muslims and Jews ---- based on how they have been abused by various nationalist and other modern Empires.
Fighter pilots have a saying that, “speed is life”. But, for all the rest of us, “inclusiveness is life” --- and tribalism is death by the oldest lie of empire.
Racism is another deadly old lie of empire.
Nationalism is a somewhat newer lie of empire, but just as deadly in the 20th century.
While, economic ideology is the newest, and current, lie of empire (which is causing our economic, and environmental collapse).
But all the lies and deceptions of empire-thinking lead ineluctably to the very same grave --- so choose your empire poison, stupidly. Or choose your inclusiveness, wisely.
Alan MacDonald
Sanford, Maine
Oh I agree, you are looking at the macro view and putting this all in a wider context. However just to play devil's advocate, Walt and Mearsheimer (The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy) claim that AIPAC et al. have an undue influence on US foreign policy and that this policy undermines US (neo-imperial) interests in the region. The anaylysis is not from a normative view, rather from what I see as a traditional neo-Realist (IR theory) perspective.
J. James Foster
Oakland, CA
James, you rightly note that many "claim that AIPAC et al. have an undue influence on US foreign policy and that this policy undermines US (neo-imperial) interests in the region".
But so do the Exxon and MIC lobbies, from slightly different imperial perspectives.
However, both are merely expressing the power of Empire-thinking.
Best,
Alan
An intelligent person would see the reality.
The Jews, believing themselves the 'chosen ones' were a dangerous people, then they were dispersed by the Romans after 79 C.E. and that was a perfect solution. They were allowed to exist in their fantasy of "chosen state"---but not given the power to slaughter the innocent, except on a very small scale.
Then 60 years ago, the victors of WWII (mostly by accident) decided that they would give the Jews their 'state'----so they evicted hundreds of thousands of Palestinians by force, then armed the Jews, then the Jews began their slaughter all over again. It was a terrible mistake.
Learn from history. Disperse the Jews for the last time, return Palestine to the people it was named for, even by the Romans----and the slaughter of the innocent (at least there) will cease.
A 'footnote' for those believers , whether Jews, Christians, or Muslims out there: You should worry about a "God" that needs so much help from so many humans----he just can't seem to do without "YOU BELIEVERS"---- that was (according to the myth) after creating ALL of the "things" in the Universe (in six days no less) he still needs help from humans------
That could be translated into a 'credibility gap'------or---a "Myth"......
Good Luck "Believers", you need it---since your "God" seems to be 'sleeping'.
Perhaps being
" dispersed by the Romans after 79 C.E. and that was a perfect solution," is wrong ?
Recent evidence of historians is that the " Diaspora " never occurred, other than as a recently reformulated story to support the Zionist's cause.
If that is true, the second part of your quote "a perfect solution," is falling directly into the propagandizing hands of the Zionists.
Perhaps you might reconsider ( or reword ) ?
Namaste
Yes!
Much of the history of the Jewish people that we are taught may be a myth:
Dr. Schlomo Sand, an Israeli scholar, has a lot to say about this. Dr. Ilan Pappe, another Israeli scholar, is another good source. Dr. Norman Finkelstein and Joel Kovel (US academics) also have a lot to say about this.
I am sure that I would reword if you would be so kind as to provide a 'citation'.
My information comes from the Roman "side" of the story----not the Zionist,Christian,Islamic.
One of the reasons the Jews cannot be trusted to keep their "treaties" is that they believe themselves to be "the chosen" and exempt, even when they loose the wars they start themselves.
The Christians and especially the Americans have been afflicted with the same 'delusions' and they also are begining to loose their hold as well.
Thanks
I was not disagreeing with your overall postition, NativeSon, my references were only to point out new research that actually would reinforce it.
Please understand that I was not "arguing"---I would simply be interested in knowing any new sources of information. if you have some new information please share it.
Thanks
I thought I did,
In particualar: Shlomo Sand (2008) "When and How Was the Jewish People Invented?"
His claims are interesting but by no means without controversy.
We are both perceiving various aspects of a common reality, fractured by various sources along the many paths to this moment.
I know your words, and perceive you as an honorable person, whose commitment to a much larger arc of historical justice is much as my own. I suspect we might be cousins, certainly in belief if not blood as well.
Both the "Manifest Destiny" of ( white = in power ) Americans and the "Chosen People" baloney of Jews is completely self serving and hypocritical. America choose its 'path of devastation cut from sea to blood running sea' and the Jews chose to enter a covenant with God -- they chose God -- not the other way around.
The delusions are very strong, while the actual connection to spirit and God is without a doubt either absent or just a historical footnote.
You are correct that treaties mean little other than a prop ( to both USA and Israel ), as a means to a hidden agenda 'end of native people's existence'.
My thanks to you
… for being the voice of so many silenced ones,
tragically suffering under the wheels and foundations that underpin "American Success" ( as that were, whatever it is ).
It is about the denial of inclusion in the fold of commonality, well after many other 'native sons' have died for a country that is pleased to accept their sacrifices for the greater good -- while denying the equable sharing of the fruits of that greater good.
Please forgive me for my reckless inhumanity, cruelty, and dishonorable theft of land and life. I would re-name our national Thanksgiving holiday, to our new reverent
" Native Son Thanksgiving Day ",
but know that even that is not enough … for the crimes perpetrated upon so many millions for so long.
Namaste
powerfully_true : "Recent evidence of historians is that the " Diaspora " never occurred,"
Can you bring some evidence to support your claim that the Diaspora never occurred? Are you calling Emperor Adrian a lier? Are you saying that all the scrolls found near the dead sea are fake?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bar_Kokhba_revolt
In the past, I've heard of Holocaust denial. This is the first time I've heard of Diaspora denial.
wiki is hardly acceptable as an academic reference;
I am not even close to an expert on this, however:Dr. Schlomo Sand, an Israeli scholar, has a lot to say about this. Dr. Ilan Pappe, another Israeli scholar, is another good source. Dr. Norman Finkelstein and Joel Kovel (US academics) also have a lot to say about this
Do a search on these authors and read what they have to say before arrogantly dismissing them.
I've read material by Dr. Ilan Pappe, (which I respect) and Dr. Norman Finkelstein (which I found to be less than accurate.)
Nevertheless, both focus on events taken place in the 20st century and not in the 2nd century.
I've asked for reference form powerfully_true that "proof" that Jews were not expelled from Judea by the Romans during the second century. (As per his claim that the "Diaspora " never occurred.)
An intelligent person would know that the Jews were dispersed by the Romans after 135 C.E, and not 79 C.E
A few additional comments:
- The victors of WWII (U.S.S.R and U.S.A), did NOT evicted hundreds of thousands of Palestinians by force.
- Committing ethnic cleansing against the Jews of Israel will not end the slaughter of the innocents in planet earth or in the Middle-East. Humans managed to slaughter each other perfectly well even without Israel.
-U.S. President Barack Obama's Middle East envoy told Israel's ultranationalist foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, on Thursday that Washington wants to see the creation of a Palestinian state.
Hooray for the corporate party!...oh wait didn't Bush say the same thing in June 2002? 'fraid so chumps! More recently Obama restocked Israel's supply of bombs that were depleted in Gaza City. Change you can believe in!
I'll see your two state solution and raise you to a non-theocratic secular state with rights for all.
Joe
It is on its way Joe. When the USA falls (shortly) the Israelis will as well, then the Islamists will need to fight it out among themselves---with no winner----
After all of this 'God' mythology runs its course perhaps humanity will have a chance.
If they survive.
Thanks
Conservatives will never give you peace.
I agree with you. Avigdor Lieberman is bad news.
Is it not interesting that the Zionists are using Nazi tactics as if they invented them? Perhaps we can look forward to gas chambers for the Palestinians sometime soon. After all it would appear that Zionism and Nazi'ism are one and the same, only changed a fwe names!
That's a damn lie! Israel will never allow it and they control America! Only a fool would buy into this story. If you doubt what I say, do the research, I have and Israel calls the shots for military action on the Gaza strip every day! America just looks the other way!
Sen. George Mitchell's 2000 "Mitchell Report" on the Middle East became the backbone of the "Road Map" to peace, which called for a halt to Israeli settlements and an independent viable Palestinian state by 2005.
Meaningful negotiations for peace are unrealistic unless all parties have the right to be heard and given equal voice and justice must be sought; just as Mitchell did in Ireland.
Since 1995, Mitchell has been active in the Northern Ireland peace process as the United States Special Envoy for Northern Ireland. Mitchell led the commission that established the principles on non-violence to which all parties in Northern Ireland adhered to and which then led to an all-party peace negotiations. The Good Friday Agreement, officially known as the Belfast Peace Agreement was signed on Good Friday 1998. It was Mitchell's personal intervention with all sides that brokered success beyond the talks.
The split between Hamas in Gaza and Fatah in the West Bank can-and must be reconciled and a coalition government can-and must be formed; for the popular struggle for self-determination and freedom from oppression and occupation can never be sanctioned to death.
In the past the U.S. and EU have refused to deal with a coalition government until Hamas agreed to recognize Israel. Times have changed and Hamas is not going away, so Mitchell must talk with them and they should be allowed the opportunity to participate in a coalition that would recognize Israel as a state while upholding their right to not accept "the right of any power to rob our land and deny us our national rights."
On April 5, 2009, in Prague speaking about a nuclear free world, President Obama ended with, "Words must mean something…There is violence and injustice in our world that must be confronted. We must confront it by standing together as free nations, as free people. I know that a call to arms can stir the souls of men and women more than a call to lay them down. But that is why the voices for peace and progress must be raised together…Human destiny will be what we make of it."
Human beings have rights and states and nations have obligations; and there can be no peace without justice. Justice requires the honoring of the rights of the indigenous people to be free from occupation and the mission for Mitchell at this time is to aggressively pursue an End to the Occupation through justice. Justice requires listening to both sides, holding each equally accountable for their actions and to the same standards.
Eileen Fleming, Author, Founder WAWA:
http://www.wearewideawake.org/
Producer "30 Minutes With Vanunu" and "13 Minutes with Vanunu"
The Israeli's have no right to be asked, to give the Palestinians land, it should be, the other way around.The Jews are the invaders, and should accept what the Palestinians desire to give. The Jews want to strike Iran, or rather, expect the US to, so if Iran is controlled, the Jews will feel safe to invade Syria, and Lebanon, and rid the Palestinians. It is all for power ,and the greed for land. It does seem they have some kind of hold on the United States, and hope, one day we find out. Will a catastrophe occur, to BLAME Iran, so we will be in WW3, as Bush tried for, to please Israel??
MADDY "The Jews are the invaders, and should accept what the Palestinians desire to give. The Jews want to strike Iran, or rather, expect the US to, so if Iran is controlled, the Jews will feel safe to invade Syria, and Lebanon, and rid the Palestinians. It is all for power ,and the greed for land."
The Jews are truly evil people, aren't they?
So, MADDY, what's the next logical step?
The next logical step is to compel this rogue flyspeck state, which comprise 0.08% of the world population, to understand that its citizens chose to live in a sea of Arab nations and that peaceful co-existence with them is the only viable long-term possibility for it
Why is Israel more a "rogue flyspeck state" than any other state on this planet?
[Mitchell said that Lieberman told him about Israel's desire to "make economic improvements" in the West Bank]
Is Mitchell saying that Lieberman wants more Israeli settlements on the west bank? Or is that just how I'm reading that statement?
The following story seems related enough to the above Reuters piece by Jeffrey Heller.
"Peres dismisses talk of Israeli attack on Iran",
by Dan Williams, Reuters, Apr 16 2009
http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m53473
QUOTE:
JERUSALEM, April 16, 2009 (Reuters) - Israeli President Shimon Peres rejected speculation on Thursday his country might attack Iran to deny it the means of making nuclear weapons and said U.S.-led diplomacy was the solution.
Washington favours negotiations for curbing Iran's uranium enrichment, a process that can produce bombs. Such overtures have drawn scepticism in Israel, which sees a nuclear-armed Iran as a mortal threat, though Tehran denies having hostile designs.
The advent of Israel's rightist Netanyahu government has redoubled international concern that Israel could go it alone with preventive strikes against its arch-foe's nuclear sites, even at the cost of falling foul of the Obama administration.
But Peres's office quoted him as telling visiting U.S. envoy George Mitchell: "All the talk about a possible attack by Israel on Iran is not true. The solution in Iran is not military."
A ceremonial head of state, Peres lacks executive powers but is privy to policy-making. As a top defence official in the 1950s, he was key to acquiring Israel's French-made Dimona reactor, which is assumed to have produced the Middle East's only atomic arsenal. He was also twice prime minister.
A spokesman for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declined to comment on Peres's remarks.
It would not be unprecedented for the premier to disagree with Peres on a matter of such strategic import. As opposition leader in 1981, Peres tried, and failed, to dissuade hawkish Prime Minister Menachem Begin from bombing Iraq's reactor.
BLUFFING?
Commenting on recent Western efforts to engage Tehran, Peres said: "Broad international cooperation must be created on the Iranian issue.
"It is in our common interest that through dialogue with Iran the world discover whether there is an opportunity in Iran, or whether Iran is bluffing."
The statement from Peres's office said Mitchell reiterated Washington's "absolute and strong commitment to the security of the state and the people of Israel".
The United States, like Israel, has refused to rule out military force against Iran. But senior Obama administration officials have been publicly cool to the idea of opening a new front given the unfinished wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The U.S. Army Times quoted Secretary of Defense Robert Gates as saying in a speech this week that while an attack could delay Iran's nuclear programme by up to three years, it would "cement their determination to have a nuclear programme, and also build into the whole country an undying hatred of whoever hits them".
Iran has vowed to retaliate for any attack with ballistic missile strikes against Israel and U.S. Gulf assets.
Israel plans to hold its biggest missile defence drill next month, though officials say there is no connection to specific threats.
Iran's acquisition of a bomb can be prevented only if "Iranians themselves decide it's too costly", Gates said, according to the Army Times.
"We need to look at every way we can to increase the cost of that programme to them, whether it's through economic sanctions or other things." (Editing by Ralph Gowling)
END QUOTE
Will the two state solution be modeled after our own Native American two state (reservation) solution. The genocidal phase to get the Palestianian's attention looks familiar. But, I don't seen any "Palestianian" schools set up by the Israeli's to re-educate the Palestianian children in order to assimilate them into the Jewish culture as second class citizens like we did the Navives here. Could it be that the Israeli's are just immitators who can not hope to attain the heights of Evil that the U.S. has reached in it's short history? Myths and Bibles and all manners of hocus pocus aside, the history of the U.S. is as blood drenched as any, and how can we expect any change in our lifetime, particulary, when nearly half of the citizenry supports the present behavior.
I think hell will freeze over first before the right-wing Israeli government accepts this notion. And to prevent this from ever happening, Israel will just continue stealing land and the western world will just continue looking the other way.
there will be NO Palestinian state.
Israel wants ALL of Israel and will NEVER concede to palestinian land claims.
Jonah the Prophet
California USA
http://jonahtheprophet.tk
Engrave that prophecy in granite,
Not one square inch will revert
Or Arab know Palestine again,
Except as prisoners,
And them gone soon.
Palestine,
I got the blues
for you.