Experts Available to Discuss Obama-Netanyahu Meeting
(Washington,
DC) -- President Barack Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu meet today in Washington, DC amid growing signs of a policy
clash between the United States and Israel over prospects for peace in
the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. As U.S. unease over Israel's policies
in the Occupied Palestinian Territories mounts, the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation
is making available experts for interviews and commentary on the
Obama-Netanyahu meeting and what it means for U.S. policy toward
Israel/Palestine. According
to Bennis, "President Obama, who has strongly supported the idea of a
two-state solution since his campaign, has yet to articulate whether or
not he is actually prepared to spend some of his massive political
capital to exert serious pressure on Israel towards that end - for
example by conditioning (even some) of the currently committed $30
billion in U.S. military aid to Israel, on a complete Israeli
settlement freeze in the West Bank. If he means it, this could be the
moment. Netanyahu's campaign rejection of the two-state solution, his
rejection of continuing the current Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy and
instead limiting negotiations to economic issues, and his extreme
racist Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman all serve to make a serious
U.S. effort towards Israeli accountability not only timely, but less
politically costly than ever. However, although there is no question
that President Obama supports a two-state solution in the abstract,
that is not enough. The question is what he is willing to do to make it
happen - since Israel on its own, secure in its so-far unconditional
U.S. military aid and uncritical protection in the UN and elsewhere,
has no intention of doing so."
Who: Phyllis Bennis, Senior
Fellow, Institute for Policy Studies; Steering Committee Member, US
Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation; Author, Understanding the
Palestinian-Israeli Conflict: A Primer
Who: Bill
Fletcher, Jr., Senior Scholar, Institute for Policy Studies; immediate
past president of TransAfrica Forum; Steering Committee Member, US
Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation; Co-Author, Solidarity Divided:
The Crisis in Organized Labor and a New Path toward Social Justice
According to Fletcher, "The recent Israeli elections have put into
place an administration completely hostile to a peaceful settlement of
the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Netanyahu's refusal to speak to a
two-state solution and instead to discuss economic advancement of the
Palestinians is reminiscent of those in the early 20th century who held
that African Americans should not challenge Jim Crow segregation but
should rather improve themselves economically, as if economic
advancement can happen for an oppressed people in the absence of
political freedom.
"President Obama needs to put genuine pressure on the Israeli
government. This means that there must be a policy of no-tolerance for
continued Israeli settlements in the Occupied Territories; there must
be a dismantling of settlements; there must be a cessation of Israeli
provocative actions against the Palestinians; and there must be a
commitment by Israel to a just settlement that guarantees genuine
national self-determination for the Palestinians. This is what must be
asked of President Obama. Continued unconditional support for Israel
over the Palestinians brings us no closer to peace, but instead brings
the world closer to catastrophe."
Who: Josh Ruebner, National Advocacy Director, US Campaign to End the
Israeli Occupation; former Analyst in Middle East Affairs at
Congressional Research Service.
According to Ruebner, "In order for President Obama to achieve his
stated policy goals of ending Israel's siege of the Gaza Strip,
freezing settlement expansion and halting home demolitions in the West
Bank and East Jerusalem, and achieving a negotiated just peace in his
first term, it is clear that he will need to exert U.S. leverage on
Israel and its Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. This means that the
United States should end, or at the minimum, condition its military aid
to Israel to achieve these goals. Instead, however, President Obama
recently asked for $2.775 billion in military aid for Israel in his
FY2010 budget proposal with no string attached--an increase of $225
million over this year's allocation. Providing Israel with this blank
check is the surest way for the United States to continue to enable
Israel's 42-year military occupation of the Palestinian West Bank, East
Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip and its systematic human rights abuses of
Palestinians."
The US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation is a national coalition of more than 280 organizations working to change to U.S. policy toward Israel/Palestine to support human rights, international law, and equality. For more information about the US Campaign, please click here.