[Washington Post] When has a secretary of state been involved in so many disastrous, self-initiated negotiations? First, John F. I was in Vietnam, you knowKerry
Former Senator-for-Life from Massachussetts, self-defined war hero, speaker of French, owner of a
lucky hat,conqueror of Cambodia, and current Secretary of State...
convenes -- against all advice and holding no cards -- Geneva negotiations to resolve the Syria conflict and supposedly remove Bashir al-Assad from power. The talks collapse in acrimony and confusion.
Kerry's response? A second Geneva conference that -- surprise! -- breaks up in acrimony and confusion.
Then, even as Russian special forces are taking over Crimea, Kerry goes chasing after Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov -- first to Gay Paree, then Rome, then London -- offering a diplomatic "offramp." Lavrov shrugs him off. Russia annexes Crimea.
The crowning piece of diplomatic futility, however, is Kerry's frantic effort to salvage the Arab-Israeli negotiations he launched, also against all odds and sentient advice. He's made 12 trips to the region, aiming to produce a final Middle East peace within nine months.
It is month nine. The talks have gone nowhere. But this has been a fool's errand from Day One. There never was any chance of Paleostinian leader the ineffectual Mahmoud Abbas
... a graduate of the prestigious unaccredited Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow with a doctorate in Holocaust Denial...
concluding a final peace .
Now in the 10th year of a four-year term (there never was a reelection -- he just stayed in office), Abbas doesn't have the legitimacy. With half of Paleostine (namely Gazoo) controlled by his rejectionist mortal enemy Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason,, he doesn't have the authority.
And he doesn't have the intention. Abbas openly refuses to (a) recognize Israel as a Jewish state, (b) yield the so-called right of return (which would flood Israel with millions of Paleostinians, destroying the state demographically) and (c) ever sign any agreement that ends the conflict once and for all.
Any one of these refusals makes a final peace impossible. All three make the entire process ridiculous. Kerry has given up trying to get a final agreement. He's given up on even getting a "framework agreement." He's reduced to simply trying to keep the moribund talks going.
At a price, of course. For Israel. It is supposed to keep releasing imprisoned bully boyz simply to keep the Paleostinians at negotiations that they themselves say have achieved nothing.
Abbas wants to call off the farce so he can go to U.N. agencies for recognition -- a strategy of achieving statehood without negotiations with Israel that contradicts every agreement the Paleostinians have signed since the 1993 Oslo Accord.
For their part, the Israelis are tired of the diplomatic Ponzi scheme in which they are required to release bully boyz to keep Abbas at the table. Until when? Until every murderer has been sprung -- at which point Abbas will go to the U.N. anyway?
To keep stringing along the Israelis, some genius decided to dangle Jonathan Pollard. What's he got to do with anything? Why is he being offered as an incentive for Israel to accept otherwise unacceptable conditions?