Reishit Chochma - The Beginning of Wisdom for the Obama Administration?

From remarks given at the Jerusalem Conference, Feb, 17, and excerpted in The Jerusalem Post, Feb 23.

In January 2010, President Barack Obama granted an interview to Time Magazine to mark his first year in office. In discussing the Middle East peace process Obama admitted, “…the Middle East peace process has not moved forward. And I think it's fair to say for all of our efforts at early engagement, it is not where I want it to be. I'll be honest with you. This is just really hard.”

Here in Israel there were people who responded, “Boker Tov, Eliyahu [Good morning Elijah!].” In the United States, the similar response is more direct and not as articulate, and it goes, “Well duh.”

Yes, making peace in the Middle East is really hard, but President Obama’s frustration may actually reflect a historical and almost predictable truism about American Middle East policy in the first year of a president’s term.

The following is an excerpt from Si Kenen’s book Israel’s Defense Line, Her Friends and Foes in Washington. Kenen, my mentor, was the founder of AIPAC. He wrote almost 30 years ago in 1981:

“During the first year of a new presidential term, the petro-diplomatic complex invariably pressures the incoming administration to downgrade Israel and to court Arab friendship. That has been true in every first year except 1965, when Lyndon Johnson was beyond Arab reach. After the election, dust settles on the [parties’ pro-Israel political] platforms and Israel’s foes use inoffensive euphemisms to urge Washington to be ‘more impartial, more evenhanded.’”

Historians can verify Kenen’s formula. Look at Eisenhower’s pressure on Israel to withdraw from the Sinai in 1957, when he threatened to block contributions from American Jewish organizations to Israel. The Administration tried to divide the Jews of America with Secretary of State Dulles inviting a group of major Jewish philanthropists, including leading non-Zionists, to use their influence to persuade Israel to accept the U.S. position.

Jimmy Carter’s term is another classic proof, with him pushing in his first year for a “comprehensive settlement” with all the parties to the conflict, including the Soviet Union. None other than Egypt’s Anwar Sadat saw the folly of such a policy, and he and Israel’s Menachem Begin succeeded in securing the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty, despite Jimmy Carter and his initial objections. Carter went on to accuse Menachem Begin of lying on the issue of freezing settlement construction, claiming that it was to be an indefinite freeze. Sadat himself, as well as notes from the meetings at Camp David, and members of Carter’s own diplomatic team all backed Begin’s claim that the freeze was to be for a duration of no more than three months.

Carter was supported by a small group of radical Jews who pushed for recognition of Yasir Arafat’s PLO. The organization was called Breira, and it never amounted to anything very serious, but it served as a precursor of another fringe organization formed 30 years later – called J Street, a group that describes itself as Obama’s “blocking back.” Like Breira it supports Administration pressure on Israel, condemned Israel defending itself, and calls for negotiations with Israel’s most implacable foes. The only difference is J Street’s sophisticated PR and its large budget.

Eisenhower admitted years later that he was mistaken for pressuring Israel. In 1965 he told his friend and Jewish leader Max Fisher, “... looking back at Suez, I regret what I did. I never should have pressed Israel to evacuate the Sinai.”

What was the reason for Ike’s regret? First, maybe because he recognized that with the United States making the maximalist demands on Israel, the Arab states had no reason to make any concessions in the peace process. Why should they? It was a repeat of the British policies of taking the Arab side in the 1920s when disputes erupted between the local Arab and Jewish communities: Murderous Arab mobs attacked Jews in Hebron, Jaffa and Jerusalem, yelling “Addowlah ma’anah! The government is with us! Itback el yehud! Slaughter the Jews!”

Today, why would Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas be willing to demand anything less on the settlement issue than what President Obama demanded just months ago – a full freeze in the West Bank and Jerusalem?

I believe Eisenhower also realized that the withdrawal would lead to war, something we in Israel learned the hard way after the withdrawal from Gaza in 2005. Neither withdrawal was secured by negotiations with iron-clad guarantees or a change in the uncompromising hatred of Israel – in the 1950s and 60s it was Gamal Abdul Nasser’s hatred that led to the 1967 war; in the last few years it was the hate of Hamas, the local branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, that led to Operation Molten Lead.

Indeed, President Obama’s recent recognition that there is no quick fix for the Middle East conflict may be what we call in Jewish tradition, “Reishit Chochma” the beginning of wisdom. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton repeated it February 14 at the U.S.-Islamic World Forum in Doha. “This is hard work,” she said. “I know people are disappointed that we have not yet achieved a breakthrough. The President, Senator Mitchell, and I are also disappointed. But we must remember that neither the United States nor any country can force a solution.”

The Administration as it starts Year Two has apparently finally learned that the linkage of Iran to the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations was a recipe for disaster. Half a year ago, a senior White House official reportedly declared, “Any treatment of the Iranian nuclear problem will be contingent upon progress in the negotiations and an Israeli withdrawal from West Bank territory."

What a victory for Ahmadinejad was inherent in that alleged statement.

Since then we’ve come some way toward that “Reishit Chachma,” the knowledge that there is no quick fix, and Israel’s neighbors should pay attention to the messages now coming out of Washington. Sen. John Kerry, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and a close ally of the Obama Administration, also spoke at the U.S.-Islamic World Forum last week where he banished the utopian Pollyannish vision of the Administration’s first year:

“Peace alone will not solve all the region’s problems,” Kerry said. “Ask yourselves: If peace were delivered tomorrow, would it meet the job needs of the entire region? How many more children would it send to school? Who really believes that Iran would suddenly abandon its nuclear ambitions? So we know that Israel/Palestine is central, but we must develop a much more practical partnership that extends well beyond regional conflicts.”

With this more realistic attitude toward the region, there is reason for some optimism as the U.S. and Israeli leadership begin their second year in office.

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