Obama To Propose Peace Plan?

David Ignatius reports that President Obama is “‘seriously considering’ proposing an American peace plan to resolve the Palestinian conflict, according to two top administration officials”:

“Everyone knows the basic outlines of a peace deal,” said one of the senior officials, citing the agreement that was nearly reached at Camp David in 2000 and in subsequent negotiations. He said that an American plan, if launched, would build upon past progress on such issues as borders, the “right of return” for Palestinian refugees and the status of Jerusalem. The second senior official said that “90 percent of the map would look the same” as what has been agreed in previous bargaining.

The American peace plan would be linked with the issue of confronting Iran, which is Israel’s top priority, explained the second senior official. He described the issues as two halves of a single strategic problem: “We want to get the debate away from settlements and East Jerusalem and take it to a 30,000-feet level that can involve Jordan, Syria and other countries in the region,” as well as the Israelis and Palestinians.

Here again is an affirmation by the administration that the U.S.’s goals in the region are “linked.” While this idea is gaining acceptance among policymakers — largely because it’s so patently obviously true — it’s worth noting that that Dennis Ross and David Makovsky rejected the argument, or at least a strawman version of it, in their recent book. Ross is currently a special adviser to President Obama on the Middle East.

It’s also good to read this:

“Incrementalism hasn’t worked,” continued the second official, explaining that the United States cannot allow the Palestinian problem to keep festering — providing fodder for Iran and other extremists. “As a global power with global responsibilities, we have to do something.” He said the plan would “take on the absolute requirements of Israeli security and the requirements of Palestinian sovereignty in a way that makes sense.”

The experience of the last twenty years shows pretty clearly that incrementalism — a step-by-step process of “trust-building” — creates an an incentive for the building of more settlements that can then be cast by Israeli negotiators as huge “concessions” in the event that Israel agrees to give them up. It also creates opportunity for Palestinian extremists to use violence to frustrate the process at steps along the way.

One of the main challenges for President Obama’s attempt to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been the almost complete lack of a sense of urgency among the Israeli public for a peace deal. Having walled the Palestinians off in Gaza and the West Bank, and enjoying an economic boom, many Israelis are able to persist in the illusion that the status quo is sustainable. But, as the rising tensions in East Jerusalem should demonstrate, it’s not. Proposing its own plan, and getting Palestinian and Arab buy-in for it, would offer the Israeli public, and the Netanyahu government, a pretty stark choice.

The tendency in the past has been to move slowly on the peace process in times of relative calm, and hastily in moments of crisis and violence, and then, when the immediate crisis has passed, go back to baby steps. But, as Defense Secretary Gates and Gen. David Petraeus both recently made clear, the lack of progress on Israeli-Palestinian peace generates difficulties for U.S. interests in the region, both in times of crisis and calm. The best way to avoid the next crisis is to move with urgency during a period of relative calm.