Elliott Abrams

Pressure Points

Abrams gives his take on U.S. foreign policy, with special focus on the Middle East and democracy and human rights issues.

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by Elliott Abrams
June 21, 2011

A group of very well-known American leaders has written an open letter to the president blaming almost every aspect of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on Israel and urging heavy American pressure to change Israeli policy. If Israel does not comply, the letter suggests, the president should impose “consequences.”

The letter appears in the current edition of The New York Review of Books, and the group is led by Lee Hamilton. It is disturbing that such views characterize the influential signers of the letter, and that they chose to attack Israel while many have remained silent on the bloodshed, death, and repression in Libya and Syria. While uprisings there and in Tunisia, Bahrain, and Egypt are proving each day that what happens between Israelis and Palestinians does not determine the fate of the Middle East, the letter reflects the apparently unshakeable belief that the central and fundamental problem in the region is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Even the evidence of the Arab Spring appears unable to defeat this attitude.

In this week’s edition of The Weekly Standard, I analyze and criticize the letter and the policies it proposes.

Post a Comment 4 Comments

  • Posted by Dan Friedman

    Regardless of the “disturbing” nature of the letter to Obama, the writers knew they’d find a receptive audience.

  • Posted by MichalG

    European history tells us that unsolvable conflicts always end with a war and tragedy…

  • Posted by Dean Smallwood

    This letter is nothing less than a rubber stamp for the Anti-Israel faction within the U.N. I can understand Brzezinski and Hamilton signing on to wrong-headed foolishness like this … But Frank Carlucci too ?

    The success of this proposal depends on three unrealistic points :
    1. That the Obama Administration will forcefully “oppose” the undermining of Israel’s security .
    2. That Iran’s influence can be peacefully neutralized .
    3. That reconciliation between Hamas and Fatah is a positive .

    These people are living in “Fantasyland” !

  • Posted by Danny Black

    Wasn’t Hamilton the genius who declared the Iraq War lost in 2006? I seem to remember he recommended buddying up to the mass murderers in Iran and Syria. I guess unless you are shooting unarmed civilians demanding more accountability from their government you just can’t be a real ally….

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