This past weekend, diplomats descended on Paris with the ostensible goal of hammering out a proposal that would get Israelis and Palestinians back to the negotiating table. What transpired, writes Eran Lerman, was not only an “exercise in diplomatic futility” but an obstacle to any successful resolution of the conflict:
The French didn’t manage to bring the Israelis to Paris and, to add to the absurdity, even the Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, who had endorsed the effort, was a no-show, [although he spent the day at a nearby hotel]. Mainstream Palestinian factions not aligned with Abbas’s West Bank government criticized the conference and, no matter how well-intentioned he may be, the French foreign minister Jean-Marc Ayrault will not get Hamas in Gaza to abandon its firm ideological commitment to violence or its total rejection of the peace process itself.
For decades, Palestinian hopes have been pinned on an imposed solution. The Paris conference certainly did not give them that—it did not have the clout to do so. However, the danger lies in the possibility that momentum from the conference will be harnessed toward convincing the international community to rewrite the terms of reference for future negotiations—and therein lies the peril. Once the conference hosts and their partners recognize their inability to get Hamas to accept the peace process, they will have no choice but to ignore their realization that before peace can even be possible, a top priority is “reuniting Palestinians under a single, democratic and legitimate Palestinian authority.” . . .
A sober look at the realities—as embodied, for example, in President Bush’s letter to Ariel Sharon on April 14, 2004—would indicate that an implementable agreement must reflect some basic facts on the ground. To encourage the Palestinians to believe that much more can be achieved by means of international pressure—like pushing Israel back to indefensible lines, or carving up the living city of Jerusalem (which, following the recent terror attack there, would look like a reward for terrorism)—is to harm their long-term interests by selling them on a fantasy.
Read more on Times of Israel: http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/the-paris-conference-the-costs-of-diplomatic-delusions/