It appears that when it comes to talks on the future of Palestine, leverage does not work in quite the way that Archimedes came to understand it. Israelis can exert leverage by, for instance, refusing to stop building illegal settlements in the Occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem or by suspending the promised release of Palestinian prisoners. However, when the Palestinians seek to deploy some of their own, far more limited leverage, the Israelis cry foul. And worse, it is clear that the United States backs them in this phony gambit. Thus, when Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas decided to press ahead with the formal signing of international treaties that would advance Palestine's claim to statehood, US Secretary of State John Kerry cancelled a meeting with Abbas scheduled for yesterday. Abbas said he had resumed the campaign for international recognition of a Palestinian state because the peace talks were going nowhere. It is more than likely that in his long and detailed talks with Kerry, he made it clear that this was an option that he would deploy if there was no real progress in the talks. Therefore, the hyperactive US politician cannot have been surprised by the move. What has been surprising is his reaction and what it demonstrates. Whenever the Israelis push back against any part of the peace process, the steady increase of illegal settlement construction is the most common tactic, Kerry himself, or just occasionally some of his people, rush to the office of Israeli premier Benjamin Netanyahu to talk about it and to see what can done to soften the impact on the peace process. In the end, this generally results in anodyne waffle from the Israelis promising to be better next time. This is wrapped up by Kerry's spin doctors as a small but important concession and Kerry himself then urges everyone to get back to the negotiating table. But look what has happened when Abbas has tried the same tactic. Why has not the Kerry cavalcade rolled up outside the presidential office in Ramallah? Why is Kerry not seeking to finesse the Palestinian move toward international recognition as a state in the same way that he would do with Israeli settlement building? And does it matter to him or his boss Barack Obama back in Washington that while Israeli colonization of the West Bank and East Jerusalem has been ruled utterly illegal by the United Nations, there is absolutely nothing illegal about what Abbas is doing? The Palestinians are perfectly entitled to seek international recognition of their existence as a state whose sovereignty has been violated for 60 years. Kerry wants the secret framework talks to be extended beyond their original deadline of the end of this month. Even though the negotiations seem to be going nowhere, thanks in large part to Israeli intransigence and because Netanyahu only pays lip service to wanting a two-state solution, Kerry wants them to continue. The reason is obvious. If they fail, then he has failed. He set out to be the US secretary of state who finally succeeded in Palestine where every predecessor had failed. But from the outset, America's enduring partiality toward Israel robbed him of Palestinian trust. He had a reset moment yesterday when he could have kept his appointment with Abbas. But he blew it.
