Peace Talks or No Peace Talks – We’ve Been Here Before, I Think!

“Palestinians hand Netanyahu letter, Fayyad absent” – I think this was the Reuters headline, but whoever composed it had it retweeted solid for over two hours this evening (and possibly for the rest of the night) on the “Twitsphere” (or is it “Tweetiverse”?).

So Mahmoud Abbas is sending Bibi love-letters and Fayyad is jealous – no, I don’t think so somehow. But we do know, because the letter was conveniently “leaked” earlier today, that much of the content is the same old same old. Just a week ago, the Quartet (see here) encouraged both the Israelis and the Palestinians to sit down again without preconditions (something Bibi has said so often that maybe we should believe him) – and now the long-awaited letter is sent, containing the same old preconditions (settlements, Jerusalem, ’67 borders, return of refugees…). The Daily Beast summarised the alleged contents of Abbas’ letter to Netanyahu here.

This time, the threat if these preconditions are ignored is that the PLO will return to the UN and seek recognition for a state from the General Assembly; something they would almost certainly get but which would mean little in reality from the point of view of seeing a real nation state come into being. What it would do is give the PA some leverage in using UN agencies and bodies in their ongoing political campaigns against Israel.

You may have missed it, but the PA suffered a setback Read more of this post