File Under: Barack Hussein Obama Finding answers, one file at a time…

Palestinians accuse U.S. of killing peace prospects – Hilary’s Hijab on the hotseat

By Jeffrey Heller

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Pointing an accusing finger at the United States, the Palestinians on Sunday said Washington's backing for Israeli refusal to halt Jewish settlement expansion had killed any hope of reviving peace negotiations soon.

On a one-day Middle East visit on Saturday, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton endorsed Israel's view that settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank should not be a bar to resuming negotiations -- contradicting the Palestinian position.

U.S. President Barack Obama himself, after persuading Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in September to meet Netanyahu in New York, called only for "restraint" in settlement, not the "freeze" he had previously proposed.

Stung by Obama's about-face and Clinton's remarks, the Palestinians voiced their frustration.

"The negotiations are in a state of paralysis, and the result of Israel's intransigence and America's back-pedaling is that there is no hope of negotiations on the horizon," Abbas spokesman Nabil Abu Rdainah said.

He said the Palestinians were calling for the Arab League to formulate a "unified Palestinian-Arab position" on the stalled peace process.

[the whole story]

More dithering? Sadly, this administration appears to be conducting themselves on the world stage in much the same way they do here at home... Either say one thing and do another, or say one thing and simply back pedal later with little or no explanation. With all do respect, we shouldn't even have a female trying to negotiate anything when it comes to the Middle East. Anyone with even a cursory understanding of their culture recognizes the position women hold within their society... Note the "head gear" Hilary wears in all pictures of her taken out doors while traveling over there... HOW can we as a nation send a woman to "negotiate" with people who treat their women as second class citizens at best? Never mind the cultural illogic behind this thinking, but has Hilary no conscience? There was a time in the not so distant past when countries of questionable civil rights practices were publicly denounced by The US... Are we "open for business" with everyone now?

It's always a noble gesture to reach out to people of all cultural backgrounds, both at home and abroad, for this is how we learn to better understand one another. The problem is, what good is this understanding if we're not going to be allowed to actually learn from it, and adjust our behavior based on that knowledge? How much compatibility is their between people who celebrate the likes of Paris Hilton and those who force OUR Secretary of State to put on a headdress? Has this country EVER forced a visiting dignitary from ANY country to alter their appearance in order to travel in this country?

Perhaps I'm being a bit simplistic in these observations, foreign policy is a weighty issue... However; at some point we have to look at what's in front of our eyes and ask ourselves, in the grand scheme of things, are things getting better or worse for us in trying to deal with these people as we have for the last ten or fifteen years? Would we not be safer focusing our efforts on locking down our own borders and securing those of questionable device who are already here? Does anyone fear Afghan rebels flying jets over US airspace or launching ICBMs at us? It seems to me, we could let these people train in their caves on the mountain to be terrorists to their hearts content, if we just start taking measures to KEEP THEM OUT OF OUR COUNTRY.

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