Ruminations on a Coalition Crackup

The NYTimes informs us that President Obama apparently spoke through Martin Indyk to Nahum Barnea in the now-infamous Yediot Ahronoth piece that thrashed PM Bibi Netanyahu's government and singled out the settlement movement - the raison d'être of the national religious revisionist Zionist Israeli right wing that now characterizes the rank and file of Likud, Yisrael Beitenu, and Jewish Home - as the primary reason for the peace talks breaking down.  This apparently ignored Mahmoud Abbas' refusal to speak straight to President Obama about the rumored Kerry Framework, despite Bibi's acceptance with reservations.  The real takeaway from this turning point is this: the Likud-YB coalition is about to fall into tatters. To wit:

- Tzipi Livni looked like a rock star in that piece.  It should come as no surprise that she's taking the peace talk initiative and meeting with Abbas to restart talks.  The once likely PM has begun her road back to the top spot.
- Netanyahu is so frayed that he's focusing on a Jewish Nation State Basic Law and codifying Torah/Talmud as the basis and inspiration of Israeli Law.  I wonder how Ben-Gurion would have felt about that?
- The Hamas-Fateh unity deal continues to march forward.  From this, Abbas' successor shall come, but perhaps not before the dissolution of the PA in an attempt to burn the Israelis.  We'll come back to this.
- Germany, with US backing, has suspended a gunboat deal with Israel.  Will this finally snap the Coalition's back?
- Would Yair Lapid enter a coalition with Shas?  If he would, then Livni's Hatnuah, Herzog's Labour, Gal-On's Meretz and Lapid's Yesh Atid could form a ruling coalition.

There's a parallel here and I want to put it down: Israel's politics right now, in a very broad way, look like the US of the mid/late 00's.  The old Reagan coalition of conservative working class Democrats, Evangelicals, fp hawks, economic libertarians was fraying and the burgeoning Obama coalition was being born.

In Israel, something similar is happening.  The national-religious movement is becoming more insular and subject to "no true Scotsman" tests.  The secular Zionist middle class that seeks to preserve the basic Zionist dream and improve living standards has broken apart from that (save for the 5 major settlements.)  These people, the Livni/Lapid/Shavit/Oren-bloc, seek to "unburden" themselves of the Occupation and be done with it.

Unilateralism will emerge as the Israeli buzzword.  The self-reliant backbone of Zionism is growing stronger and while Lebanon and Gaza were botched withdrawals, there is an obvious course of conduct:

- Abbas will saber rattle about PA dissolution, the increased settlement activity will make Judea and Samaria more intertwined.  The median Israeli will want out of this predicament.
- A new, pro-2 state (note: not pro-peace) Coalition will emerge based on completion of the security fence, withdrawal from beyond it, and a Marshall Plan of aid to the new West Bank Palestinian government.
- Annexation of the major settlement blocs and fortification of the fence will create a potential Gaza situation, but more likely a propped up PA (perhaps briefly dissolved and reconstituted as more blatantly Fayyadist) will re-emerge and massive state building will ensue.
- Israel and Palestine will sign an accord recognizing this state of affairs and dual sovereignty.  The Palestinians may take their cases to court, but the Right of Return will never happen (there may be national compensation.)
- Israeli entry to NATO and I/P both joining the EU.

This platform, along with massive nation-building through the Negev, will carry the day and set the score for Consolidationist Zionism.  Finishing the victories of the movement and establishing a durable, if imperfect peace not unlike South Korea's.

An Honest Broker

Please, if you have any interest in the I/P conflict at all, READ THIS.

This is absolutely stunning, and something close to the inverse of Camp David. I think the key takeaways here are that:

a) This was in Hebrew in the largest newspaper. The key readership is Israeli. Netanyahu’s coalition is shaky enough as it is. Note the glowing words about Tzipi Livni, who despite Hatanuah’s poor showing in the last election, has already carried a general once. I think this is as much about trying to change the hearts and minds of Israeli voters and build the antipathy towards the settler movement and its representatives like Bayit Hayehudi. Kerry’s recent statement reflected that, too. The current coalition simply doesn’t have a realistic vision of peace and most of it doesn’t want it under any circumstance (like Uri Ariel.)

b) Tom Friedman’s reporting on the Framework was accurate, that the general reaction (the Framework was very favorable to the Israeli position) was not unnoticed by the Americans, and that coalition intransigence was at the center of the breakdown.

c) Urgency. Abu Mazen is nearing the end of his time in public life, is seeking a successor, and seems to genuinely want peace. Yair Lapid this week said that Hamas can be negotiated with. Livni no doubt agrees. Bougie Herzog obviously does, and Zahava Gal-On (whoever many seats Meretz has) would probably rather as many people at the table as possible. This is meant to create urgency, precisely to counter the sort of inertia and “sustainability” that Roger Cohen described the Occupation as having.

“Unsustainable” is the administration keyword on this. It’s the keyword of the secular Israeli middle class and Tel Avivians. It’s the way any right-thinking Zionist thinks of this. The idea is to foment a coalition that gets it and is willing to make peace, especially on favorable and mutually agreed upon terms like the potential Kerry Framework could be/have been.

I am very, very curious as to the domestic Israeli media response to this as well as the NYT/WaPo response.

Framework

Regardless of my (secular, Diaspora) own inclinations (a duly, fairly negotiated two or three state settlement) I suspect the actual outcome to the peace process will look like this:

a) Completion and fortification of the security barrier, akin to annexing an additional 7%-ish of the West Bank.

b) Declaration of the barrier as a border. There would be total withdrawal from beyond the border with the exception of necessary and duly administered security coordination. Functionally, this means that most of Jerusalem would be Israeli.

c) Settlers who do not repatriate and are beyond the Wall become Palestinians. The Right of Return would not be recognized. Very significant aid and assistance would be available to any Arab Israeli wishing to move to Palestine.

d) A massive aid package to the PA in the West Bank.

e) Economic + security coordination and cooperation with the PA in the West Bank, along with massive EU/Jordanian/American influence and dozens of Rawabi projects in a sort of Marshall Plan in exchange for implicit recognition.

f) This last bit could be a bit pie in the sky, but: passage of a formal constitution encompassing the existing Basic Law and defining the borders of the State of Israel and its character as a Jewish nation-state (I'm very curious as to opinions on this.)

Essentially, something like what Michael Oren or Ari Shavit has laid out. I think it happens sooner rather than later. I think it goes without saying that the coalition that enacts this likely won't include Jewish Home or Yisrael Beteinu (maybe even not Likud, considering the rank and file?) I think there's some European protest, but not a ton. I think Americans would largely support this, despite the lack of a peace process imprimatur. I don't think relations with Jordan or Egypt would break down. It's a crappy but likely livable solution (akin to South Korea?)

Chemi Shalev says it better than me

http://www.haaretz.com/blogs/west-of-eden/1.587895

Israeli protestations notwithstanding, the West Bank and Gaza can be compared legitimately – if not altogether accurately - to places such as Bophuthatswana, Venda, and Ciskei, the South African Bantustans with which Israel, sadly, was the only country in the world to maintain formal ties in the early 1980s. Ariel, “the capital of the Shomron” actually signed a twin city agreement with Bhisho, the capital of Ciskei.

Indeed, Israel’s prolonged support for the apartheid regimes of white South Africa is one of the main adhesives that help the comparison between the two to stick. Contrary to latter-day revisionism, Israel’s deep links with the apartheid regime were not only a product of its international isolation following the 1973 war, but also of a basic identification of many in both Labor and Likud governments with South Africa’s self-portrayal as a bastion of Western civilization withstanding communist, anti-Zionist and Third World hordes, including the African National Congress.

Whatever the other pros and cons of the apartheid allegations about Israel, they provide biblical proof, at the very least, that what goes around comes around, or as Hosea puts it, “they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind." 

The Incredibly Disappointing Week That Was

(This ran longer than I expected it to, it’s still a touch embryonic. If anyone reads, please do comment!)

I don’t really think it’s an accident that this leaked. I don’t really think Kerry’s assessment is wrong, either.
As the Occupation continues and deepens, a two state solution grows more and more imperiled. With that comes the choice: a Jewish state or a democracy. Plans to annex Area C only add to this problem, as would the “Autonomy on Steroids” Bantustan proposed by Naftali Bennett today. Given the events of the last week (Fatah-Hamas unity involving Gazan leadership, Abbas’ acceptance in Arabic of the Holocaust), I don’t see how anybody can take Bibi Netanyahu’s commitment to a 2 state solution at face value anymore. Even if you accept that there is a 2 state vision he’d get behind, it is as far removed from reality as Hamas’ unitary solution.
Andrew Sullivan (in a piece I disagree with for reasons I’ll get to in a moment) just posted this well-written bit: link to dish.andrewsullivan.com

Sullivan’s analysis isn’t out of place with anything you’d see on Mondoweiss or Electronic Intifada. Probelmatically, it also ignores Yesh Atid, Hatnuah, or the desperate-for-peace Israel left led by Labour’s Bougie Herzog. I suppose, by Sullivan’s analysis, Americans were all pro-torture warmongers in 2004? Roger Cohen’s piece in the Times was essentially true: the status quo is sustainable for Israel, and however odious it may seem, most Israelis appreciate their safety and economic growth. That’s the real problem, particularly as Netanyahu pivots towards being a Russian client due to common ethos and the growing influence of the Soviet bloc.

The animosity between the Netanyahu and Obama administrations is real, visceral and clear as day. The neutral vote on the Ukraine may well have been the final straw for Obama (whereas Moshe Ya'alon's slur of Kerry and the lack of appropriate sanction by Netanyahu appears to have burnt that bridge.) The pivot towards Putin is as much a product of the Soviet segment of Israeli society as any other, but the Soviet anti-democratic culture has clearly suffused the Israeli body politic: this ain't your father's Israel with Labour as the party of Government. If it was, then the Olmert Plan would still be on the table, the Arab League proposal would be taken seriously, and the differences would be hashed out in short order.

My hope is that the Obama admin’s pressure cracks up the Netanyahu coalition, that Lapid bolts to the opposition along with Livni, and that a newly installed Prime Minister Herzog meets with the moderate new Palestinian President (al-Masri? Fayyad? Dahlen?) Even if you think that’s Utopian (and even I’m inclined to say that my hope might be…) I think the likelihood is that Michael Oren is right and there will be a unilateral disengagement in the near-future contemporaneous with PA efforts towards UN recognition that the US may well support. The moment that a two state solution is impossible and a one state solution is inevitable (which I contend is still a little ways off), the position of the Israelis will shift from immoral Occupier to apartheid governor.

One final bit: The Daily Beast (which also hosted Andrew Sullivan and Peter Beinart) just released the American Secretary of State saying this after Barack Obama spoke with similar frankness to Jeffrey Goldberg a mere month ago. There is no war with Iran. Apartheid is a loaded word meant to scare the Israeli public and government, a sort of step up from the mention of BDS a few months back. These are not things that puppets say. At what point can we speak frankly on this blog about the nature of the “Israel Lobby”: that it’s not some all powerful tail that wags the dog, but rather the more obvious answer that the reflexive Likudnik tendencies of most Washingtonians are dulling due to a combination of the obstinacy and shameful governance of the Netanyahu coalition and the deeper influence of realpolitik retrenchment following the neocon adventurism of the Aughties (as embodied in Obama’s foreign policy)?

An Orderly Treason: Part I, The Scene

Without having any real bearing on my life, I have to admit that I find the upcoming Scottish Independence vote endlessly fascinating.  For a few reasons. 

One one level, the UK's constitution-less, democracy is such a novelty onto itself, so any systemic change is the wonk version of watching a slo-mo version of Jenga. Those of us raised in a stable constitutional Republic have no idea what's going to happen.  We can only watch the wobble and wonder.

On a more specific level, this is watching a version of our own fringe impulses play out in HD.  Whether it's certain Southern states who periodically have propositions on their ballots calling for succession.  Or the liberal parties where I've heard people idly talk about either allowing the Southern states to succeed or calling for the coasts to succeed and form their own union.  Scotland is the reality.  However, the other reality is that this is only possible in a parliamentary system where third-tier parties can affect wide change in a matter of years and make a Shakespearian power grab.  The Scottish National Party is a far left party that has almost no influence in Whitehall but holds absolute power in Scotland.  Labour and the Tories have been harried out of Scotland, with as much totality as Bishop Laud harried the Puritans out of England.  So the SNP and First Minister Salmond are able to carve out their own fiefdom within the UK but, as so often happens when upstarts take power, they see no end to how much power they COULD have.  If they would only stick their courage to the sticking post.  Ask Aarron Burr. 

First Minister Salmond thinks he has a shortcut to being Prime Minister Salmond.  I know that that is slightly slanderous, since we can name plenty left wing leaders who wish to escape right wing control during Republican years, and vice-versa, based mostly on sincerely held beliefs and not personal ambition.  I have no good reason to assume that Salmond is any different. 

I just have my assumptions.

(I have more to write about this but wanted to do it in pieces, this one just meant to set the scene.)

Healthcare Reform 2: The Quickening

My co-author, being an ignorant slut, is still parroting his belief that what he reads on the syndicated NYT opinion pages or the WSJ opinion pages have any traction within the larger right-wing rank and file.  Specifically, on one topic: healthcare.

What my friend cannot seem to see is that healthcare reform reform, much like immigration reform, is a cause without an Army.  On the right-wing.  A banner with no legions behind it.  Those who even broach the idea, in a lesser-of-two-evils vein, are almost immediately shot down as collaborators.  The right-wing (not even the far right) have talked themselves into a corner.  They have not said that ACA is wrong or ineffective or bad policy.  They say, and have the conviction I might add, that it is fundamentally unconstitutional and illegal.  Without a hint of irony, they say that President Obama and all those who have passed ACA are guilty of treason.  They say this quietly, to their own.  Boehner goes on TV and says that ACA is bad policy but I think we can finally appreciate that this is the thin veneer of moderation.  Most of his members and the blogs and the talking heads, when discussing it, say words like "un-American" and "unconstitutional."  This is the reality of the right-wing.

They no longer have the ability to talk about ACA in any vein except the repeal vein.  I think most pundits say and think that they refuse to talk about anything but repeal out of some simplistic old-fashioned stratagem of refusing to accept defeat and give your enemy a victory by backing down. Buying time for them to work a backroom deal. That would imply that they COULD talk about anything but repeal.  The rank and file right-wing will paint anyone who even attempts to keep and alter ACA as on par with Neville Chamberlin's negotiations.  Fundamentally flawed.

The polling about whether this constituency or that group supports certain provisions, such as the pre-existing conditions provision, misses the point entirely.  The author, the brief history, the name, the paper the law is written on is, itself, toxic in the right-wing's calculus.  And let's be honest, this isn't SS or medicare or income tax, which all share a similar hatred with ACA in the eyes of most of the right-wing.   Those are propped up by a much longer history to make them appear much more solid and complicated in the calculus of the rank and file.  That time has interwoven them into the fabric of many people's idea of America.  ACA has no such luck.  To right-wingers of all stripes it is a cancer within the American system.  The (vast) majority of right-wing is convinced of two things (1) repealing ACA is possible and (2) repealing ACA is their patriotic duty.

No reform plan, no matter how well made or sensible or conservative will make it past the most vocal/passionate/convinced/active members of the right-wing, or as more commonly known: the Republican primary voters.

Stephen Walt joins John Mearsheimer again

This strikes me as not unlike the moment in which John Mearsheimer doubled down on his defense of the anti-Semite, Gilad Atzmon.There is, at this point, good reason to believe that both Mearsheimer and Walt's motives are indicative of something much darker, and their analysis should be viewed through that prism. 

http://www.haaretz.com/news/features/.premium-1.586082

 

 (I don't think it's paywalled, as I don't sub and was able to read it in full.)

Shalev: "Aren’t you absolving the American hawks, who ruled this country for at least eight years, of any responsibility? Are you saying that Bush and Cheney and Rumsfeld were just putty in the hands of the Israel lobby? Are they simpletons?"

Walt: “Well, if you’ve read the book and I haven’t persuaded you, then I haven’t persuaded you. And we’ve spent almost all of our time talking about one chapter of the book.”

I certainly think that Walt and Mearsheimer had impeccable academic credentials prior to the publication of the Israel Lobby. However, I think that's inapposite here. The question is one of motivation and overtones. I don't think that the article was unfair in its depiction of Walt. 

Shalev was very, very upfront about his own misgivings heading into the interview and while I obviously posted the salacious "money quote" from the very end, I don't think there's any misrepresentation there, either Mearsheimer & Walt's original critique was massively mono-causal, used a definition for the Lobby so broad as to be worthless, and utterly imbalanced. I don't think it's a stretch to say that their support for Israel doesn't go much past lip service (which is strange, especially considering Mearsheimer's own advice on the former Yugoslavia.) This is probably a point where I should make clear that I am strongly opposed to the sitting Likud-YB coalition, the rightward drift empowering the likes of Uri Ariel, Moshe Ya'alon, the forever odious Naftali Bennet and his disturbing Area C annexation plan, and look forward to the moment that the burgeoning Labour-Shas alliance forms the basis for a new coalition (perhaps picking off Livni/Hatnuah? Would Lapid go back on his promise to avoid any coalition with Shas?) after elections (which seem like they might happen soon?). A peace based on the Kerry Framework, the 08 Olmert offer, or the '02 Arab League Initiative would be immensely preferable to the untenable, morally and pragmatically appalling Occupation. 

I think it's reasonable to mention that the imagery invoked by The Israel Lobby is similar to the tropes which have defined anti-Semitism for ages. It's obviously important to consider that when writing on the topic. The allegation, repeated by Walt in this interview, that Israel is the tail that wags the American dog (in the personage of Paul Wolfowitz, to start) is a deeply troubling one. It is not hysterical to say that the modern anti-Zionist cottage industry (the Andrew Sullivan/Mondoweiss school, not quite the MEM/Electronic Intifada variety) owes a heavy debt to Walt and Mearsheimer. 

Moreover,  Mearsheimer's own dark motivations were made clear when he endorsed - and then doubled down - a book by Gilad Atzmon, an outspoken anti-Semite of the most boorish variety (http://www.theatlantic.com/.../john-mearsheimer.../245518/

 

 I went with Goldblog, but Walter Russell Mead is similarly useful if you'd prefer:http://www.the-american-interest.com/.../john.../

 

). Here, Walt took a step in the same direction by elucidating what amounts to a rank conspiracy theory with deeply pernicious undertones. It's not the first time, either (http://ottomansandzionists.com/.../stephen-walts.../

 

 ). 

That's the point of this post. Not that Adelson-style blind faith and devotion to Eretz Yisrael is the only politically viable statement (it's prima facie not), but rather that Walt has given away his darker motives, just like Mearsheimer, and it's time that we reckon with that in the discourse, just as we should any other factor.