The chapter begins with Hillary explaining briefly the history of the
Palestinian flag, its symbolism, and her impression upon finding it
flying beside the Israeli flag at the residence of Israeli Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when she arrived for a close, tight, tiny
meeting in September 2010. Only Mahmoud Abbas, Hillary, George
Mitchell, and Netanyahu himself were secluded in Bibi's personal study.
An impatient press was gathered outside. Things were tense. A
construction freeze was about to expire.
The photo below was taken
early in her tenure at State when she attended a conference on
humanitarian aid to Gaza. The Obama administration entered this arena
to a three-day-old cease-fire and a Gaza reduced to rubble and in dire
need of humanitarian aid. Reading it now, we might feel as if we have
come full circle and need another of these donor conferences for the
region.
March 3, 2009 by
still4hill
All
of us recognize that human progress depends on the human spirit. That a
child growing up in Gaza without shelter, health care, or an education
has the same right to go to school, see a doctor, and live with a roof
over her head as a child growing up in your country or mine. That a
mother and father in the West Bank struggling to fulfill their dreams
for their children have the same right as parents anywhere else in the
world to a good job, a decent home, and the tools to achieve greater
prosperity and peace.
On that first official visit to
the Middle East she met with both the outgoing Israeli government and
the incoming one. Hillary's first phone call as secretary of state to a
foreign leader was to Ehud Olmert.
March 4, 2009 by
still4hill
March 4, 2009 by
still4hill
There
is a long time friendship between the Clinton and Peres families. At
this meeting he gave her a bouquet composed of every flower that grows
in Israel.
March 4, 2009 by
still4hill
Her
Israeli counterpart, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, met with
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton astoundingly rarely. Far more
frequently she met with Prime Minister Netanyahu and Defense Minister
Ehud Barak.
June 17, 2009 by
still4hill
She
visited an English language teaching program in Ramallah. Amideast is a
major source of Middle Eastern students to U.S. universities. They
manage government scholarships for Saudi students and also Fulbright
scholarships.
March 6, 2009 by
still4hill
The issue at this point was the controversial
Goldstone Report. All of the links below contain policy comments about it.
September 30, 2009 by
still4hill
October 24, 2009 by
still4hill
October 31, 2009 by
still4hill
November 4, 2009 by
still4hill
November 4, 2009 by
still4hill
November 4, 2009 by
still4hill
March 19, 2010 by
still4hill
The
announcement, right before AIPAC and while Joe Biden was visiting
Israel of 1,600 new settlement units to be constructed was considered a
major insult to the U.S. Obama was furious, and it was Hillary's job to
communicate that to Netanyahu. Bibi denied responsibility but did not
cancel the construction.
March 22, 2010 by
still4hill
Last
fall, I stood next to Prime Minister Netanyahu in Jerusalem and praised
his government’s decision to place a moratorium on new residential
construction in the West Bank. And then I praised it again in Cairo and
in Marrakesh and in many places far from Jerusalem to make clear that
this was a first step, but it was an important first step. And yes, I
underscored the longstanding American policy that does not accept the
legitimacy of continued settlements. As Israel’s friend, it is our
responsibility to give credit when it is due and to tell the truth when
it is needed....
New
construction in East Jerusalem or the West Bank undermines that mutual
trust and endangers the proximity talks that are the first step toward
the full negotiations that both sides say want and need. And it exposes
daylight between Israel and the United States that others in the region
hope to exploit. It undermines America’s unique ability to play a role –
an essential role – in the peace process. Our credibility in
this process depends in part on our willingness to praise both sides
when they are courageous, and when we don’t agree, to say so, and say so
unequivocally.
April 29, 2010 by
still4hill
In
2011 Goldstone retracted part of the report. The damage had already
been done. The Palestinians were planning to put a statehood vote
before the Security Council.
Hillary points out that the Obama
administration policy, indeed, U.S. policy, is and has been a two-state
solution as stated in Obama's Cairo speech. This was not a new policy
and had remained a U.S. goal from the Clinton administration through the
George W. Bush administration But a vote in the Security Council was
not the intended route. There were supposed to be negotiated
compromises.
She recalled their visit, before the speech, to the
Sultan Hassan Mosque and the peace and calm she sensed there in the
middle of a presidential visit and major policy rollout.
June 4, 2009 by
still4hill
Ten days after the Cairo speech, Netanyahu endorsed the two-state solution in a speech at Bar-Ilan University.
For
Netanyahu, the major sticking point from the start was the condition of
a freeze on construction of settlements. He announced a 10-month
freeze on October 31. Hillary called the move "unprecedented" and felt a
good deal of kickback for the word which she continues to stand by.
Abbas, for his part, agreed to delay the statehood vote at the U.N.
November 1, 2009 by
still4hill
Hillary
got along especially well with Ehud Barak and speaks fondly of him as
endlessly optimistic and a voice for peace. He evidently also had her
on speed dial and would ring her up and say, "Hillary, let's
strategize." They met officially on a frequent basis and were quite a
pair!
When,
in May 2010, there was an Israeli attack on a Turkish flotilla of
pro-Palestinian activists bound for Gaza resulting in the death of nine
Turkish citizens, Barak called Hillary while she was marching in the
Memorial Day parade.
May 31, 2010 by
still4hill
Turkish
Foreign Minister Davutoglu warned that this could mean war between
Turkey and Israel, called it Turkey's 9/11, and was at the State
Department the next morning. He was very emotional. Hillary contacted
Netanyahu who wanted to patch things up but would not apologize. During
her tenure, he never did apologize, but called Erdogan in March 2013
when Obama was in Jerusalem with an apology. According to Hillary the
patching up is still in progress.
June 1, 2010 by
still4hill
Peace talks began in early September in Washington D.C.
September 1, 2010 by
still4hill
September 2, 2010 by
still4hill
September 2, 2010 by
still4hill
...
by being here today, you each have taken an important step toward
freeing your peoples from the shackles of a history we cannot change,
and moving toward a future of peace and dignity that only you can
create.
The upshot was that the parties agreed to
meet in Sharm el Sheikh in two weeks. Hillary commented that her work
as secretary of state frequently brought her to lovely resorts. She
never had the opportunity to enjoy any of them for all the work that
needed to be done.
September 10, 2010 by
still4hill
September 14, 2010 by
still4hill
September 14, 2010 by
still4hill
September 15, 2010 by
still4hill
September 15, 2010 by
still4hill
September 16, 2010 by
still4hill
September 16, 2010 by
still4hill
September 16, 2010 by
still4hill
Later
that month she met with Abbas and Ehud Barak on the sidelines at UNGA.
No statements. One photo. No real progress. President Obama pressed
for an extension of the freeze. Abbas was essentially saying "choose
between peace and settlements." Hillary spoke with Ehud Barak but Bibi
refused to budge. Abbas was ready to go ahead with a statehood vote in
the Security Council while Hillary kept telling him the only path to
peace was via negotiations. In a phone call with Bibi, Hillary
encountered intransigence.
Then, In November a door opened a crack, and Hillary flew to New York to breeze through it.
November 11, 2010 by
still4hill
November 11, 2010 by
still4hill
November 13, 2010 by
still4hill
Eventually
there was a proposal to halt construction for 90 days in exchange for a
$3 billion security package and a promise to veto any resolutions at
the U.N. that would undercut negotiations. No one liked this solution
including Hillary. She told Tony Blair that she felt it was a
sacrifice worth making. It began to disintegrate almost at birth and
was dust by November.
Hillary took a strong stand at the Saban Forum in December.
December 11, 2010 by
still4hill
The
United States and the international community cannot impose a solution.
Sometimes I think both parties seem to think we can. We cannot. And
even if we could, we would not, because it is only a negotiated
agreement between the parties that will be sustainable. The parties
themselves have to want it. The people of the region must decide to move
beyond a past that cannot change and embrace a future they can shape
together.
President Obama went to the State
Department to reiterate the U.S. position regarding the 1967 lines with
mutually agreed swaps. Bibi ignored the swaps part of that and Abbas
could not guarantee that a new push for statehood would not happen at
the U.N.
George Mitchell resigned.
Hillary says the tiny
private meeting in September 2010 at Bibi's residence when he raised the
Palestinian flag to welcome Abbas to his home might have been the last
time Abbas and Netanyahu spoke. It might have been.
If Bibi is going to threaten to fire his chief negotiator, Tsipi Livni, for talking with Abbas and has to conceal this possible meeting, chances for negotiation look bleak.
Hillary ends quoting Yitzhak Rabin. "The coldest peace is better than the warmest war."
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