Q&A with Ehud Yaari on U.S.-Israeli Relations
Article Summary and Author Biography
Ehud Yaari answers questions about U.S.-Israeli relations and the Middle East peace process.
EHUD YAARI is Lafer International Fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and Middle East Commentator for Channel 2 news in Israel. He is the author, with the late Ze'ev Schiff, of Israel's Lebanon War and Intifada: The Palestinian Uprising -- Israel's Third Front.
Essay
Rather than pursuing a final-status deal now, Israel and the Palestinian Authority should agree to establish a Palestinian state within temporary armistice boundaries. Without it, the Palestinians may abandon the idea of a two-state solution altogether.
Reading List
An annotated Foreign Affairs syllabus on the Middle East peace process.
Snapshot
There is an alternative to the Obama administration's misguided policy, since Israelis care less about holding onto settlements than about stopping Iran's nuclear program.
Interview
Israeli Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Daniel Ayalon answers questions about U.S.-Israeli relations and the future of the peace process.
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GIDEON ROSE: Thank you.
Well, welcome, everybody. This is Gideon Rose, the managing editor of Foreign Affairs. We are delighted to have with us today Ehud Yaari, who has a very interesting and provocative piece in the new issue of Foreign Affairs called "Armistice Now: An Interim Agreement for Israel and Palestine," laying out a new option for the peace process. And as a promotional device for the issue and Ehud's article, we arranged to have a major flap in U.S.-Israel relations just so we could sort of kick off the discussions in a -- in a more aggressive and provocative way. We are lucky to have -- that's obviously a joke.
We have Ehud with us today to discuss not only his piece, but also the current mini-crisis in U.S.-Israel relations, which he has been following, not just from the Israeli side but also from the American side, where he is the Lafer International Fellow at the Washington Institute. He's one of Israel's most prominent journalists. His résumé extends out the door. I know all of you are familiar with it, so without further ado, let's get right to Ehud.
Ehud, why don't you start for a second and tell us what you think the essence of this immediate dispute is between the U.S. and Israel. Did Netanyahu know what was going to happen when Biden came? And was the dispute orchestrated on the --
EHUD YAARI: Yes, thank you, Gideon.
The prime minister and his defense minister are landing -- (inaudible) -- and I'm speaking to you from Jerusalem or near Jerusalem.
I can say that, number one, they were totally amazed by the reaction of Vice President Biden, the White House, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to the announcement of those 1,600 additional units in one of the bigger neighborhoods of Jerusalem.
Number two, I think that the sense amongst the Israeli delegation coming back from D.C. right now is that they fell into a trap. The general sense in Israel right now is that the prime minister was sorely humiliated by President Obama. There is quite a degree of amazement the way he was treated. I think it's fair to say that neither the prime minister nor his defense minister, Ehud Barak, were aware of the kind of reception that they were greeted with at the White House...
