# Israel and the USA-Why Does This Farce Continue? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 13, 2010, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387 "2010-03-13T20:04:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![MOIDALIZE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/61 "2010-03-14T20:43:10Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > The simple fact is that nobody is justified in claiming that apartments in East Jerusalem somehow actually interfere with the peace process. Those who want to privilege Palestinian claims and Palestinian demands, however, will do so. Joe Biden and Hilary Clinton seem to think it does. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/62 "2010-03-14T20:54:20Z")
> [@MOIDALIZE](#): > > Joe Biden and Hilary Clinton seem to think it does. Concur. > [@](#): > > Israeli Premier Benjamin Netanyahu apologised yesterday for the ‘regrettable incident’, which threatens to hit talks over the Middle East, including Iran. > > News of the plan wrecked Mr Biden’s first visit to the region and threatens to torpedo talks between Israel and the Palestinians. > **[Ties between U.S. and Israel 'at their worst in 35 years' over housing row](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1257887/U-S-fury-Hillary-Clinton-accuses-Israel-insulting-Joe-Biden-visit.html)** > > Israel's ambassador to the U.S. admitted that the crisis was real and dismissed attempts to play down the diplomatic row. Call me crazy, but actions which threaten to “torpedo talks” strike me as actions which “actually interfere with the peace process.” ---
**Author:** ![Maeglin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8baadc/32.png) [@Maeglin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maeglin)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/63 "2010-03-14T21:00:34Z")
I am not going to go down the at peace/at war hijack. Honestly, you are just going to irritate me too much to bother. > [@FinnAgain](#): > > The rest of your post is obfuscation. Watch this: I can assert something, too. The rest of my post is completely spot on and highly relevant. See how easy that is? > [@](#): > > As if a functional, economically viable sovereign state is worse than not having that and the tipping factor is whether or not there are currently apartments in certain areas of East Jerusalem. Having an “economically viable sovereign state” is your benchmark by assertion. If I or some other rational person were negotiating, I would be more interested in the actual value of the good negotiated than in some vague, obfuscatory, and minimalist standard that you propose. I am going to put this very simply for illustrative purposes. I own my apartment. Whether I have the legal right to it or not in this case doesn’t matter: regardless of the prior state of affairs, I possess my apartment and enjoy almost complete and exclusive rights to its use. While I use my apartment, you cannot. You can’t live in it, sell it, cook crystal meth in it, whatever. Now suppose I can support my property rights with force. Even if I don’t have the legal right to own my apartment, potential challengers need to take into account the fact that any contest over my apartment will have an uncertain outcome. You may win or you may get killed. Every apartment in my building that I own is an apartment that you can’t have. If I weren’t here and all of the apartments were vacant, the potential value to you is higher. You would be more willing to fight for apartments in my building with some external competitor if the rewards were richer. Every block occupied by in Israeli is a block that cannot be occupied by a Palestinian unless he wishes to challenge the Israeli government. Every block that is thus occupied decreases the value of the negotiated object to the Palestinians assuming the Israelis cannot be persuaded to leave after the settlement occurs. This changes the negotiation calculus for both parties and obviously changes their optimal strategies. This isn’t obfuscation; this is obvious. > [@](#): > > Not to mention that negotiations can still come to any number of conclusions, including but not limited to the annexation of EJ and all its citizens by the PA and/or Israel removing its citizens from EJ and the PA annexing it. And obviously changing the bargaining landscape changes the perceived likelihoods of these outcomes relative to each other. Have you ever had to engage in protracted bargaining before? > [@](#): > > The simple fact is that nobody is justified in claiming that apartments in East Jerusalem somehow actually interfere with the peace process. Those who want to privilege Palestinian claims and Palestinian demands, however, will do so. Well sure. We won’t know whether or not this interfered with the peace process until after everything works out, and even then it will be subject to debate. But that the Palestinian change in strategy is a response to Israeli alteration of the value of the negotiated good should be sufficiently obvious to anyone who can abstract away from the details and just see this as the bargaining game that it is. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/64 "2010-03-14T21:07:05Z")
> [@Squink](#): > > Call me crazy, but actions which threaten to “torpedo talks” strike me as actions which “actually interfere with the peace process.” Exactly as I said: those who wish to privilege Palestinian claims will argue as you’re doing. We’ve already gone over this, and despite furious handwaving, there is absolutely no causal relationship between apartments in East Jerusalem and the Palestinians _choosing of their own free will_ to stop negotiations. This is the same rhetorical waste that sees newspapers talk about how an Israeli response to Hamas rockets is going to ‘endanger the ceasefire’. The apartments do not actually torpedo jack. This is obvious to any objective observer. Anybody can see that the PA’s negotiators can simply adopt any number of negotiating planks to deal with the change. To claim that they cannot is to either allege that they’re infantile children incapable of behaving above the level of a temper tantrum or absolute idiots who do not realize that negotiation is still possible even when you aren’t already being given 100% of what you want to negotiate for before negotiations even start. If you’re honestly claiming that this has “torpedoed” talks and that it actually interferes with the peace process, do explain what’s preventing PA negotiators from, ya know, negotiating. I’m curious what magic is at work here that interferes with PA’s negotiators ability to speak. Do the apartment complexes perhaps beam out anti-PA beams that render PA citizens mute? After all, they end their ability to negotiate like a torpedo ends a ship’s ability to sail and really interfere with the peace process, obviously forcing the PA, against its will, to refuse to negotiate. Please explain the causal mechanism. Which I’m sure actually exists in reality rather than empty rhetoric. > [@MOIDALIZE](#): > > Joe Biden and Hilary Clinton seem to think it does. Well, darn. If they think so, it must be true. Perhaps you can find their quotes where they explain that, rather than adopting as a negotiating plank “and the residents of EJ shall become Palestinian citizens and we shall annex the territory and/or Israel will evacuate its citizens and we will annex the territory”, the housing leaps up and binds the PA’s negotiators’ hands with zip ties. Or maybe it is anti-PA beams that render negotiators mute and unable to continue negotiations? I’m curious as to how that’s happening, but I’m sure you can explain how it actually threatens to stop negotiations rather than the PA choosing to stop negotiations of their own free will. > [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > The issue is that, first, the international community doesn’t recognize East Jerusalem as Israeli territory or Israel’s capital But this is not a valid objection. It was Ottoman land first, then British and the initial agreements for custody were rejected by the Arab nations and via estoppel they cannot then later claim those should be enforced. It was Jordanian for a while, but that too wasn’t generally internationally recognized. Who then owns it? Israel executes sovereign control over it and there is no other sovereign entity to take possession of it at present. > [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > The Jerusalem municipal council has been accused, with some evidence, of favoring construction in Jewish neighborhoods and not allowing construction in Arab neighborhoods, thereby making Jerusalem, and specifically East Jerusalem, more Jewish. That doesn’t follow. Housing isn’t given out by ethnicity, and Arabs can live where they want to. Further, [up to 1997 Arab building actually outpaced Jewish building.](http://www.camera.org/index.asp?x_context=20&x_article=397) Additionally, [the municipality granted more housing permits for Arab building than their projected populations trends implied was even necessary.](http://www.camera.org/index.asp?x_context=2&x_outlet=35&x_article=1318) To say nothing of the fact that the issue is nowhere near cut and dried. Take, for instance, the case of Zohair Hamdan. [He collected more than 10,000 signatures from Jersualem’s Arab populace saying that they wanted to remain a part of Israel and not be under the PA. And Fatah goons shot him for it.](http://www.amislam.com/hamdan.htm) > [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > So the coherent argument would be, “Building there is wrong, because it’s part of a plan to encourage Jewish settlement of East Jerusalem, thereby making sure it stays in Israeli hands when a Palestinian state is formed.” It’s the same argument against the West Bank settlements. Except that isn’t a cogent argument, because the PA could simply annex the territory and make any Israelis there who chose to stay Palestinian citizens, or Israel could remove them if that was the negotiated outcome. What the situation boils down to is that Palestinians own a small percentage of the land privately, and it was never the sovereign territory of the PA, and yet Jewish growth in it is seen as invalid. There’s no real reason to do so. If the land ends up in Palestinian hands, it’s hardly an insurmountable problem. > [@The\_Facts](#): > > This farce continues because the very well-funded Israel lobby wants it to. They know it’s not in the USA’s interest, but they don’t care, it’s in Israel’s. Pay a few hundred million to congressmen, get a few billion in aid. Easy Peazy. Ahhh, good, the old fashioned Conspiracy Theory. Of course, there’s the massive influence of petrodollars and the cushy positions granted to those friendly with the Saudis upon retirement, and such. But, no, it’s traitorous Dual Loyalty bastards who’ve occupied America’s government in the name of Zionism. > [@elucidator](#): > > Its approximate to saying you cannot treat an infection with antibiotics if there is an infection present, that you cannot douse a fire with water because water is negated by fire, almost as if the very existence of violence makes any effort to restrain violence impossible or unworthy. False analogies sure are popular this season. I wonder why… Actually, it’s like saying that if someone is bombing you and is going to keep bombing you (you know, ongoing violence) that a peace treaty is peace is name only and war in fact (because, ya know, they keep bombing you). This is kinda the obvious point that some folks are doing their best to avoid. Violence means there is no peace, ongoing violence means that any peace treaty is not worth the paper it’s written on, because no matter who signs what _the violence will go on_. Not getting everything you ask for in negotiating (again, some people are deliberately trying to conflate “negotiation” with “unilateral concession”) does not invalidate peace and does not mean that a peace treaty isn’t worth the paper it’s written on. Glad I could clear up your honest misunderstanding good buddy. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/65 "2010-03-14T21:33:51Z")
> [@Maeglin](#): > > The rest of my post is completely spot on and highly relevant. Except, as the fact it you’re trying to avoid the actual issues and change the subject with irrelevancies, I didn’t so much “assert” anything as I pointed out that you’re attempting to obfuscate the issue because the whole “war/peace” thing which you want to avoid is indeed the heart of the matter and if they’re not at war, then peace is possible and a negotiated settlement in specific is possible. \*Unless one side chooses of its own free will not to negotiate, and then the interference to negotiations is that volitional choice. \* Despite any rhetoric or obfuscation to the contrary. > [@Maeglin](#): > > Having an “economically viable sovereign state” is your benchmark by assertion. If I or some other rational person were negotiating, I would be more interested in the actual value of the good negotiated than in some vague, obfuscatory, and minimalist standard that you propose. Turnspeak. You call the very concrete and demonstrable metric of “economically viable” obfuscatory, and then turn about and pretend that “the value of the good” is what’s at issue, deliberately ignoring that the value of land exchanged directly contributes to determining economic viability. You are disingenuously crafting bullshit dodges in order to obfuscate and avoid the very clear reality of the situation. Which, coincidentally, your new false analogy does: I’ll get to that in a moment. > [@Maeglin](#): > > Every apartment in my building that I own is an apartment that you can’t have. If I weren’t here and all of the apartments were vacant, the potential value to you is higher. You would be more willing to fight for apartments in my building with some external competitor if the rewards were richer. More obfuscatory nonsense designed to distort rather than elucidate. An accurate analogy might be that you own a number of apartments that I want to buy, and then you buy another one that I also want to buy. And instead of continuing to negotiate for the entire package or a reduced number and trying to get the best deal I can, I throw up my hands and declare that you have, to take the language of those arguing your position here, torpedoed my chance to negotiate for any apartments at all and you have interfered with my very ability to negotiate for real estate. And now there can be no negotiation and it’s all your fault. > [@Maeglin](#): > > Every block occupied by in Israeli is a block that cannot be occupied by a Palestinian unless he wishes to challenge the Israeli government. If the PA annexes it, the citizens there become Palestinians if they choose to stay. If the PA wants, they can also ask for the Israelis to be removed (if keeping the territory ethnically ‘pure’ rather than populated is their concern). And the obfuscation you’re slinging also aims to distort the simple fact that even if no Israelis were living there, the PA would still need to negotiate for that land in any case, and land they couldn’t negotiate for would still not be land they could settle on. It’s interesting that quite a few are claiming that taking a strong negotiating position that you can back away from in order to secure a better deal “torpedoes” talks but refusing to engage in negotiation at all isn’t the thing that stop negotiation. Curiouser and curiouser. > [@Maeglin](#): > > Every block that is thus occupied decreases the value of the negotiated object to the Palestinians assuming the Israelis cannot be persuaded to leave after the settlement occurs. The same nonsense. Even a block that is _unoccupied_ and claimed by the Israelis is still a block that PA citizens won’t be living on. So you’ve just spilled needless words to say “anything that Israel won’t part with is of decreased value to the PA”. Well, damn, that probably deserves a Nobel Prize in economics. > [@Maeglin](#): > > This changes the negotiation calculus for both parties and obviously changes their optimal strategies. The obfuscation is that claiming the change itself somehow prevents or interferes with negotiation rather than simply changing the dynamic. Of course it changes the calculus, that’s what I pointed out very early, that it’s a stronger negotiating position for one side that can be backed away from. Or, again, potentially one that will not be backed away from as I have to (yet again and gee I wonder why) remind someone that the territory under discussion was, in the clear majority, never privately owned by Palestinians, never Palestinian sovereign territory and only territory that they want and not territory that they have any actual claim over. > [@Maeglin](#): > > We won’t know whether or not this interfered with the peace process until after everything works out, and even then it will be subject to debate. There’s that obfuscation I was talking about. We already know (those of us who are being objective) that it hasn’t actually interfered with the peace process because there can still be a viable Palestinian state without EJ if it came to it (just like there was a viable Jewish state without Jordanian controlled Jerusalem) and because nothing, at all, about not getting EJ in the worst case or having to absorb former Israeli citizens means that negotiations cannot proceed. As a tactic, the PA is objecting. _That_ is interfering with negotiations because, yet again by rather obvious tautological definition, refusing to negotiate interferes with the ability of two sides to negotiate. Taking a stronger position does not. Those who wish to play silly rhetorical games and privilege the Palestinian position will claim that this has somehow interfered with negotiations. Those playing it straight can be up front and say “Sure, there’s nothing, at all, stopping the PA from keeping right on negotiating. Nor is the possibility of a viable Palestinian state imperiled by the total loss of any part of Jerusalem.” But that’s the way these things go. ‘Palestinians choose not to negotiate any further, Israel to blame for mind-control-ray’ ---
**Author:** ![MOIDALIZE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/66 "2010-03-14T21:43:20Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > Well, darn. If they think so, it must be true. Well…yeah. If the main driver of these negotiations feels this decision, and the timing of its announcement, are evidence of bad faith on Israel’s part, then it does interfere with the peace process. Unless Israel can convince us that it shouldn’t. But it’s not obviously true (as you seem to think) that America isn’t justified in its criticisms. Otherwise, why else would Netanyahu be scrambling to address our criticism? ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/67 "2010-03-14T22:00:31Z")
> [@MOIDALIZE](#): > > Well…yeah. If the main driver of these negotiations feels this decision, and the timing of its announcement, are evidence of bad faith on Israel’s part, then it does interfere with the peace process. Yet again, this is very much wrong. There is absolutely nothing stopping the PA negotiators from coming up with a negotiating position that asks for the new buildings to be annexed. Or for that matter, even if Israel was going to keep all of Jerusalem, it still wouldn’t stop the PA’s negotiators from negotiating for a viable state. What we have seen that could possibly interfere with negotiations is the PA boycotting future negotiations (although that, too, is really part of meta-negotiations as they’ve agreed to resume other negotiations if Israel stops the planned buildings). Again, this is because a change in the dynamic does not _cause_ a cease in negotiations but one side ceasing negotiating _does cause_ a cease in negotiations. And again, it wasn’t really the decision (which has been present, in one form or another, for quite some time now in the public) it’s that a block in an ultra-orthodox community was announced with spectacularly bad timing. > [@MOIDALIZE](#): > > But it’s not obviously true (as you seem to think) that America isn’t justified in its criticisms. Otherwise, why else would Netanyahu be scrambling to address our criticism? You’ve just committed the fallacy of argumentum ad baculum. Just because the US has the clout and power to force certain concessions from Israel does not mean that any US analysis is right if that analysis serves as the basis for forcing those concessions. The US could have, just as easily said to the PA “Stop whining about it and come back to the negotiating table and we’ll see if this issue can’t be resolved”. Would that then, by the same logic, have proved that Israel was right and the PA was wrong? Again, it’s an issue of privileging the Palestinian position. The PA voluntarily decides to suspend negotiations, and rather than pointing to that as the fact that stopped negotiations, the other thing, that didn’t actually stop negotiations, is trotted out as the cause. There is no reason, at all, that the PA’s negotiators couldn’t have come right back to the table and asked for whatever they wanted. ---
**Author:** ![MOIDALIZE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/68 "2010-03-14T22:02:39Z")
And you’ve committed the fallacy of “my opinion trumps everything” and “pretentious use of latin.” ---
**Author:** ![MOIDALIZE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/69 "2010-03-14T22:06:12Z")
Are you saying that the US, which has exerted virtually no pressure on Israel prior to this incident, is merely bullying them and has no basis for their criticism? ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/70 "2010-03-14T22:07:50Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > Did anyone read that famously conservative, anti-Semetic newspaper the _New York Times_ the other day? > > “Message from America to the Israeli government: Friends don’t let friends drive drunk. And right now, you’re driving drunk. You think you can embarrass your only true ally in the world, to satisfy some domestic political need, with no consequences? You have lost total contact with reality. Call us when you’re serious. We need to focus on building our country,” - Tom Friedman, NYT. That would be an OP ed column, and the NYT publishes stuff from all over the political spectrum. It’s Friedman talking, not the NYT-- just to set the record straight. ---
**Author:** ![Maeglin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8baadc/32.png) [@Maeglin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maeglin)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/71 "2010-03-14T22:09:54Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > Turnspeak. > You call the very concrete and demonstrable metric of “economically viable” obfuscatory, and then turn about and pretend that “the value of the good” is what’s at issue, deliberately ignoring that the value of land exchanged directly contributes to determining economic viability. You are disingenuously crafting bullshit dodges in order to obfuscate and avoid the very clear reality of the situation. Which, coincidentally, your new false analogy does: I’ll get to that in a moment. You are confused. First, please tell us how “economically viable” is concrete and demonstrable in any ex ante way. This is a heroic claim. Second, suppose you could do this. Suppose further we were negotiating over some object. If I knew that only ten units of value were required to make it “economically viable” and that this was your benchmark, I would not sell it to you for more than ten. So if I were Israel in this case, I would continue to erode the value of the disputed territory until I reached the absolute minimum concrete level of value required to yield economic viability. Someone might argue that this is exactly what Israel is doing. This looks an awful lot like salami tactics. > [@](#): > > More obfuscatory nonsense designed to distort rather than elucidate. > An accurate analogy might be that you own a number of apartments that I want to buy, and then you buy another one that I also want to buy. And instead of continuing to negotiate for the entire package or a reduced number and trying to get the best deal I can, I throw up my hands and declare that you have, to take the language of those arguing your position here, torpedoed my chance to negotiate for any apartments at all and you have interfered with my very ability to negotiate for real estate. And now there can be no negotiation and it’s all your fault. It looks like you are no stranger to the false analogy game. Let’s try another one. I am selling you my house. We both really want to make this trade, but there are several impediments that prolong the bargaining. As negotiations drag on, to my cost, I stop repairing things. When the roof leaks after we go into contract, I don’t fix it. I intentionally stop up the toilet and do not repair it. I overflow the septic tank. The terms and initial condition of the house were specified in the contract, so now you are either forced to buy the house as is or you break off the negotiations. When you see that the value of the house is no longer what you wish to pay for it, you terminate the negotiations. Whether you throw your hands up in the air and whine or not, my destruction of the value of the house has influenced your negotiation strategy. If I still want to sell the house to you, I now need to repair the toilet so we will both come back from the brink and start again. But my damage influenced your decision. > [@](#): > > And the obfuscation you’re slinging also aims to distort the simple fact that even if no Israelis were living there, the PA would still need to negotiate for that land in any case, and land they couldn’t negotiate for would still not be land they could settle on. You really need to think this through. Obviously the Palestinians would have to negotiate for unsettled land anyway. There is some probability that they would get it and some probability that they wouldn’t. The PA will end up with something between its maximal desire and its minimal desire. Israel’s action truncates the range of outcomes because now the chance of the PA getting this land is zero. So now the PA will end up with, weighted by probability, less than it would have had Israel not altered the value of the good. > [@](#): > > It’s interesting that quite a few are claiming that taking a strong negotiating position that you can back away from in order to secure a better deal “torpedoes” talks but refusing to engage in negotiation at all isn’t the thing that stop negotiation. Curiouser and curiouser. I’m certainly not making that claim. They’re both pretty much the same. Both sides will take the steps they need to take to get the best deal for themselves. I don’t blame Israel for the settlements, per se. I’d be a little frustrated with the pace of negotiations, myself, and would want to remind my partner that there are certain assymetries here that cannot be ignored. If I don’t calculate my actions just right, I run the risk of causing my partner to take me to the brink and threaten to pull out of the talks altogether. And that’s pretty much what happened. It’s just one stage in the game. I don’t hold Israel normatively responsible in any way, since it’s just trying to get the best deal it can. But at the same time, it takes a special kind of constrained rationality to argue that Israel’s actions are unconnected with the current outcome. > [@](#): > > Those who wish to play silly rhetorical games and privilege the Palestinian position will claim that this has somehow interfered with negotiations. Those playing it straight can be up front and say “Sure, there’s nothing, at all, stopping the PA from keeping right on negotiating. Nor is the possibility of a viable Palestinian state imperiled by the total loss of any part of Jerusalem.” Those who wish to think about this for a minute will realize that the Palestinians will stop negotiating when there is insufficient value for them to continue negotiating. This is a strategy. Have you ever had to negotiate anything before? ---
**Author:** ![Dick\_Dastardly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c4cdca/32.png) [@Dick\_Dastardly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dick_Dastardly)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/72 "2010-03-14T22:22:29Z")
The whole timing of this was really brazen, wasn’t it? They waited just long enough till Biden had got off the plan and made the usual no-greater-friend-than-Israel/shoulder-to-shoulder-against-terrorism speech, gone into his meeting with Netanyahu then they announced it. A great big middle finger salute to the Obama administration and the international community in general. The farce continues because American elected representatives are almost without exception bought and paid for by the Israel lobby. The US government is never going to put any realistic pressure on Israel and the Israelis take full advantage of that. ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/73 "2010-03-14T22:29:10Z")
So funding has come up a lot in this thread, with claims that we’re funding settlement building even as Americans don’t have jobs blah blah. It should be noted that most of the US aid to Israel is military aid. This is not completely altruistic; it provides jobs in america, and Israel has collaborated on various technologies. Sure, you’d rather sell than donate, but then you’d rather donate than send troops to deter Israel’s neighbours from invading again. In terms of economic aid only, the US gives more to Palestine. Edited to add: I do however think that there should be a freeze on settlement building, and that the US should be prepared to condemn some Israeli actions. At the very least, the US goverment should have a consistent position on the matter. ---
**Author:** ![MOIDALIZE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/74 "2010-03-14T23:19:56Z")
> [@Dick\_Dastardly](#): > > The whole timing of this was really brazen, wasn’t it? They waited just long enough till Biden had got off the plan and made the usual no-greater-friend-than-Israel/shoulder-to-shoulder-against-terrorism speech, gone into his meeting with Netanyahu then they announced it. A great big middle finger salute to the Obama administration and the international community in general. Seriously. **Finn** may have a perfectly cogent argument in favor of Israel’s position concerning Jerusalem, but it’s an argument they should have made during the talks. What would have been the harm in waiting? If Israel is truly unwilling to negotiate on east Jerusalem, fine. The Palestinians would still be mad and the US would still be annoyed, but at least you gave peace a chance. Regardless of whether or not the Palestinians have a valid claim to east Jerusalem, this announcement pissed them off, it undercut any assurances the US made to the Palestinians regarding a fair negotiation, and it made the US look like the weaker party in this alliance, which we won’t stand for (after awhile). It’s as if Israel thought that their position was so right and unassailable that the Palestinians would just get over it and negotiate anyway. When Israel says its surprised by our reaction, I believe them. They or anyone else in that region haven’t proven themselves to be very diplomatic. ---
**Author:** ![Dick\_Dastardly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c4cdca/32.png) [@Dick\_Dastardly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dick_Dastardly)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/75 "2010-03-14T23:39:36Z")
> [@Mijin](#): > > So funding has come up a lot in this thread, with claims that we’re funding settlement building even as Americans don’t have jobs blah blah. > > It should be noted that most of the US aid to Israel is military aid. This is not completely altruistic; it provides jobs in america, and Israel has collaborated on various technologies. Sure, you’d rather sell than donate, but then you’d rather donate than send troops to deter Israel’s neighbours from invading again. > > In terms of economic aid only, the US gives more to Palestine. > Edited to add: I do however think that there should be a freeze on settlement building, and that the US should be prepared to condemn some Israeli actions. At the very least, the US goverment should have a consistent position on the matter. Up until a few years ago the aid used to be split 60/40 military/economic but over the decades Israel have recieved so many billions of economic welfare payments that the country has become wealthy enough that the money can’t be justified anymore. Here’s a table : [http://wrmea.org/component/content/article/245-2008-november/3845-congress-watch-a-conservative-estimate-of-total-direct-us-aid-to-israel-almost-114-billion.html](http://wrmea.org/component/content/article/245-2008-november/3845-congress-watch-a-conservative-estimate-of-total-direct-us-aid-to-israel-almost-114-billion.html) Here’s a better explanation : Israel usually receives roughly one third of the entire foreign aid budget, despite the fact that Israel comprises less than .001 of the worldÿs population and already has one of the world’s higher per capita incomes. In other words, Israel, a country of approximately 6 million people, is currently receiving more U.S. aid than all of Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean combined when you take out Egypt and Colombia. This year, the U.S. Congress approved $2.76 billion in its annual aid package for Israel. The total amount of direct U.S. aid to Israel has been constant, at around $3 billion (usually 60% military and 40% economic) per year for the last quarter century. A new plan was recently implemented to phase out all economic aid and provide corresponding increases in military aid by 2008. This year Israel is receiving $2.04 billion in military aid and $720 million in economic aid there is only military aid. In addition to nearly $3 billion in direct aid, Israel usually gets another $3 billion or so in indirect aid: military support from the defense budget, forgiven loans, and special grants. While some of the indirect aid is difficult to measure precisely, it is safe to say that Israelÿs total aid (direct and indirect) amounts to at least five billion dollars annually. On top of all of this aid, a team from Israelÿs finance ministry is slated to meet with U.S. government officials this month about an additional $800 million aid package which the Clinton administration promised Israel (and the Bush administration later froze) as compensation for the costs of its withdrawal from Lebanon. The U.S. also managed to find another $28 million in the 2001 Pentagon budget to give Israel to purchase “counter terrorism equipment.” According to the American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise (AICE), from 1949-2001 the U.S. has given Israel a total of $94,966,300,000. The direct and indirect aid from this year should put the total U.S. aid to Israel since 1949 at over one hundred billion dollars. [http://www.wrmea.com/html/usaidtoisrael0001.htm](http://www.wrmea.com/html/usaidtoisrael0001.htm) And they get tens of billions of dollars of loan guarantees too, the US Treasury basically subsidising the interest rate they pay to borrow money. And they have special conditions on their military aid too, our money basically funds their arms industry : Loan guarantees are a promise to make payment if the responsible party, in this case Israel, defaults. The US has never had to pay out on a loan guaranteed for Israel, but sets aside money for that eventuality. The Congressional Research Service says such guarantees typically cost the US about 4 percent of the value of the loans, so the cost for a $10 billion guarantee program is about $400 million The US Agency for International Development puts US military and economic aid to Israel since its founding at over $154 billion, most of that since the start of the Kennedy administration. Congress also exempts Israel from the usual requirement that all its military aid be spent on US hardware. The exemption, which allows Israel to spend about 25 percent of US military aid within its own defense industry, has helped make Israel one of the largest arms exporters in the world. > **[US says no plan to cut Israel loan guarantees, but it's been tried before](https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Global-News/2010/0111/US-says-no-plan-to-cut-Israel-loan-guarantees-but-it-s-been-tried-before)** > > US Mideast Envoy George Mitchell hinted over the weekend that the US could withhold loan guarantees from Israel to pressure the Jewish state back to peace talks with Palestinians. Aid has been used to try to change Israel's behavior in the past, with... ---
**Author:** ![Dick\_Dastardly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c4cdca/32.png) [@Dick\_Dastardly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dick_Dastardly)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/76 "2010-03-14T23:43:54Z")
> [@MOIDALIZE](#): > > Seriously. **Finn** may have a perfectly cogent argument in favor of Israel’s position concerning Jerusalem, but it’s an argument they should have made during the talks. What would have been the harm in waiting? If Israel is truly unwilling to negotiate on east Jerusalem, fine. The Palestinians would still be mad and the US would still be annoyed, but at least you gave peace a chance. Regardless of whether or not the Palestinians have a valid claim to east Jerusalem, this announcement pissed them off, it undercut any assurances the US made to the Palestinians regarding a fair negotiation, and it made the US look like the weaker party in this alliance, which we won’t stand for (after awhile). It’s as if Israel thought that their position was so right and unassailable that the Palestinians would just get over it and negotiate anyway. > > When Israel says its surprised by our reaction, I believe them. They or anyone else in that region haven’t proven themselves to be very diplomatic. They know the Palestinians can’t negotiate when they do something like this because it makes the PA look weak and unwilling to stand up for Palestinians/Hamas look good if they negotiate. The one precondition the PA had for restarting negotiations (actually restarting negotiations about negotiations) was that Israel stopped building settlements. The PA can’t start negotiations after the midweek announcement without looking weak/collaborationist. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2010, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/77 "2010-03-14T23:47:18Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > Except that isn’t a cogent argument, because the PA could simply annex the territory and make any Israelis there who chose to stay Palestinian citizens, or Israel could remove them if that was the negotiated outcome. They obviously could, but much of the final settlement is going to be based on the facts on the ground, with a desire for as little population transfer as possible, which means that majority Israeli areas will likely stay Israeli, and majority Palestinian areas will likely stay Palestinian. That’s the logic of settlement. There’s nothing to say that a peace treaty can’t be negotiated while Israel is expanding settlements, any more than a peace treaty can’t be negotiated while Palestinians are blowing Israelis up. But these are both provocations, piss off the other side, and make negotiations less likely. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2010, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/78 "2010-03-15T00:01:42Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > We know, through tautological, logical necessity that there can be no valid peace negotiations in the face of ongoing violence, and there can be no peace in the face of ongoing war. Of course there can. Many peace treaties in history were negotiated while the belligerents’ troops were still fighting it out in the field. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2010, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/79 "2010-03-15T00:11:37Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > …Many peace treaties … Most, if not all, from my glancing acquaintance with history. ---
**Author:** ![MOIDALIZE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2010, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387/80 "2010-03-15T00:29:49Z")
I believe the technical term for what they did is a “dick move.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/israel-and-the-usa-why-does-this-farce-continue/532387.md?page=5)