The strife in Gaza is a story we've seen a few times before, and anyone who's been paying attention has seen it's dynamics play out on a less intense but similarly pernicious level for years now. Ta-Nehisi, grappling with the story, stumbles along the precipice of apathy:
It just feels like nothing changes. I've never understood why anyone in their right mind would accept us as an honest broker, given our declared allegiances. But more than that, I wonder why it's incumbent on us to broker at all. Lately, our judgment isn't exactly been the greatest either.
It's an understandable line of thinking. Unfortunately, though, the U.S., for all our flaws, remains in the best position to broker any kind of peace deal at all, and precisely because of our "declared allegiances" to the existance of Israel and towards a two-state solution. Few other actors can command even the measured trust that the U.S. has in Israel, or our leverage over them; and as the events of the last few days have shown, Israel has by far larger capacity to cause destruction and shift the dynamics of the two-state debate. This isn't to comment on the morality of the issues involved; Ezra handles some of the, um, cyclical aspects of that debate here. But basically I can't imagine any other actor getting Israel to budge on anything -- and budge they must -- so it falls to America's Discredited Foreign Policy (TM) to save the day. That, and without U.S. buy-in it is unlikely the rest of the Quartet will act decisively.
But beyond the question of whether the U.S. is in any position to help the two belligerents move towards peace, there is the fact that the U.S. really needs to see this conflict ended for the sake of our own national security interests. The burgeoning violence undermines U.S. security in the Middle East and around the world. This conflict has the capacity to create terrorist recruiting propaganda for years to come and give new life to moribund transnational terrorist groups lacking a focus, it undermines stability in a region where the U.S. has large numbers of troops deployed, and threatens to raise oil prices, which will be a bitter pill to swallow given the state of our economy. It can't be stressed enough how the Israel-Palestine conflict drives public opinion about the U.S. in the Middle East -- and around the world -- more so even than the U.S. occupation in Iraq. That is why it's incumbent on us to be a broker.
The other side of this discussion is that we haven't really been a broker at all in the last eight years. The Bush administration has not made the Israel-Palestine conflict a priority and it shows. Daniel Levy makes the case that the new administration cannot simply let the conflict simmer while it deals with other agenda items. Efforts at serious regional diplomacy -- not just during but after this crisis -- are going to have to be substantive and sustained. While it's unclear exactly how this conflict will effect Barack Obama's plans for the region, Politico speculates that it may make him more hawkish, mainly by asking people who don't work for him --- people who, in fact, work for AIPAC -- if it will. (Their answer: yes!) But there has been a debate brewing in Obamaland over what kind of approach to take to Israel, and breaking out of the failed policies of the past may be made harder by the current violence, which doesn't promise to change anything about the conflict but instead radicalize those involved with it. Which, as we all know, is a recipe for resolution.
-- Tim Fernholz
