Why Obama Will Ignore Israel

Why Obama Will Ignore Israel

The last week of November 2012 was a big one on the Israeli-Palestinian front. On the 65th anniversary of the partition resolution that created a Jewish state, the United Nations recognized a Palestinian one. Israel retaliated with the West Bank equivalent of sequestration: announcing it would move toward building settlements in an area east of Jerusalem called E1, which many observers believe would kill the two-state solution. European governments responded by threatening to withdraw their ambassadors.

Palestinian protestrs run from tear gas in West Bank
As Palestinians protested Israeli settlement moves, the U.S. response was “half-assed,” one source said. (Abbas Momani / Getty Images-AFP)

And the United States? It mostly watched. In 2011, when the Palestinians first sought a U.N. status upgrade, the Obama diplomatic corps lobbied so hard against it that one State Department official joked that “sometimes I feel like I work for the Israeli government.” This time, by contrast, the U.S. largely went through the motions. It was “half-assed,” observes a Middle East insider close to the administration. “They didn’t really lobby hard ... [The attitude was] if Israel ends up with a big embarrassment, who gives a s--t.”
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