Yes, it is possible they (the PA) have been misrepresented. But if so, my read is that it is being done by anti-PA, anti-American/Israeli forces. It appears likely that this information was leaked to make the PA look bad, in an effort to weaken them/prevent them from making the concessions the leakers are trying to portray. This is bad for the PA/US/Israelis.

Another thing which strikes me from what Steve wrote...it what universe is it "craven" to compromise, and where is Steve coming from that he feels it necessary to portray the PA's alleged compromise positions as such. Most rational analysts from the US recognize that it is in America's interests that this conflict be resolved. From the US perspective, if the Palestinian negotiators show a willingness to compromise and be flexible this should be lauded, not ridiculed as "craven" the way Steve does here. This is what one would expect coming from an anti-Israeli perspective, rather than a pro-US interests viewpoint.

Also, if someone now picks up a gun and shoots Abbas or Erekat, can we point the finger at Steve "words matter" Walt?

"1) If this is what Olmert and the Palestinians both offered, what exactly was stopping the Palestinians from agreeing to Olmert's offer? It doesn't strike Steve that there may be more to this than "Israel bad"?"

Or perhaps it';s just another case of Olmert saying one thing and doing another. It's not like this we haven't seen it before.

"2) Why would Abbas come out with fiery rhetoric against all of these things supposedly offered."

Ever heard of political posturing? Look up Baghdad Bob.

"3) The biggest question - if the Israelis and Palestinians basically agreed on which areas of the West Bank and east Jerusalem would be handed over, why would the Israelis building on those areas then be cause to refuse to negotiate further?"

The question is IF. As it turns out, there was no agreement.

With all the current commotion in Egypt, last week’s release by Al Jazeera of Palestinian documents disclosing what went on behind closed doors between Israeli, Palestinian and American negotiators over the last number of years seems suddenly so distant.

In light of a possible revolution in Egypt – a revolution that overnight could completely alter Israel’s strategic situation – much of what is contained in those documents seems abruptly passé, yesterday’s news, stale, and no longer relevant.

For instance, a recurring topic – and a source of disagreement – was whether an international force or Israel would monitor the eastern border of a future Palestinian state, with the Palestinians insisting on a third party, and Israel angling for a presence along the Jordan River.

According to senior European sources ( not mentioned in the PaliLeaks documents), US General James Jones, in the waning days of the Olmert government, got Israel to agree that a US-led NATO force would be stationed along the Jordan River.

One of the Palestinian negotiators’ biggest frustrations over the last few months, according to these same sources, was that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu was walking back principles that they thought were already agreed upon, and revisiting issues that the Palestinians thought were already settled.

One of these issues was the notion of an Israeli presence both on the Jordan River, and also on the West Bank hills immediately overlooking Jerusalem and the coastal plain.

If Netanyahu was insisting on an Israeli security presence along the Jordan River before the events in Cairo, he will assuredly be even more adamant about it now.

The instability gripping Israel’s neighbor in the south, as well as Lebanon in the north, will only strengthen Netanyahu’s default setting – that any peace accord must be preceded by ironclad security arrangements on the ground, and that those security arrangements can’t be a reliance on any third party. Israel must be present.

When the protestors in Tunisia led to the overthrow there earlier this month of President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, there were those who pooh-poohed a domino effect into other countries in the region, including Egypt, saying that the political culture in Egypt was different, as was President Hosni Mubarak’s relationship with the army, and his overall authority.

Egypt is not Tunisia, went the oft-repeated mantra.

And now that Egypt is on the verge of a revolution, there are those cautioning not to extrapolate from there to Jordan, saying that Jordan is not Egypt.

But what if it is? What if the events in Egypt, as worrisome as they are for Israel, spread to Jordan, and massive demonstrators threaten the Hashemite Kingdom? What if King Abdullah II is overthrown, and replaced not by Jeffersonian democrats, but Iranian-backed Islamic radicals peering through gunsights on the other side of the Jordan River? Who is Israel going to want on the west bank of the Jordan, US-led NATO forces, or Israeli ones? While a few months ago this scenario might have been readily dismissed as the paranoid ranting of the extreme right wing, times have quickly changed.

If the PaliLeaks documents show that the Palestinians were insisting that Israel clear out of major settlement blocs such as Ma’aleh Adumim and Ariel, how much more difficult are things going to be now – in light of what is happening in Egypt – when Israel is sure to demand more adamantly than ever a security presence along the Jordan River.

Twenty days ago, before Egyptian jet planes were flying low over Cairo and tanks were tumbling through the streets, Netanyahu said in a speech to foreign journalists in Jerusalem that an Israeli presence in the Jordon Valley “is absolutely required for demilitarization” of a Palestinian state.

“We left Lebanon, Hizbullah came in,” Netanyahu said. “We left Gaza, and there was an Egyptian army that was there and is still there, and Iran walked in. And we need to have some safeguards that we don’t repeat this a third time, because obviously the security of the nation is at stake, and the security of our people, the security of peace, is at stake.

“There’s a country with which we had tremendously close relations,” Netanyahu said. “We had the exchange of the leaderships; there were exchanges between our security forces; economic trade. That country is called Iran. And that changed overnight.

“There’s another country with which we had flowering peaceful relations: meeting of leaders; joint military exercises; 400,000 Israeli tourists a year – that country is called Turkey.

“The conclusion of a formal peace doesn’t guarantee the continuation of the peace,” he said. “But the security arrangements that are there, they help buttress the peace and they also protect us in case peace unravels, in case Iran walks in or tries to walk in.”

Now, some Egyptians are calling for the israel-Egypt Treaty to be abrogated. So much for peace treaties with any Arab state if they are torn up with a change of government, in contravention of international law. Israel gave up Sinai, an area 3 times larger than Israel and a great land buffer against invasion, for an apparently worthless piece of paper.

How paranoid of you. Are you perchance Prof Walt writing under a nomme de plume? Or perhaps Sheikh Nasrallah? Or simply yet another Zionist conspiracy nut? Now go eat your matzah made of the blood of Christian children, as described by Mutapha Tlass, Syrian Minister of Defense. Geez! Don't expect peace in this century with such nonsense filling the minds of folks in the Mideast and in certain academic circles.

"Olmert says that he offered and never heard back from the palestinians it will be in the Israeli paper this weekend."

The PA did respond and did so publicly.

We drank too much Zionist Kool Aid..

TA

It suited US interests to maintain a certain level of conflict in the ME, primarily because such conflicts can be controlled, fine tuned as it were, whereas without conflict heaven knows what would come about. Besides, it keeps oil prices higher than they might otherwise be, which is good for oil company profits, and offers a healthy market for armament sales. I don’t suggest anyone actually sat down and thought this through but as it came about, largely because of Israel, its advantages loaded the upside.

One cannot, however, freeze a political situation; just think how many tumultuous revolutions Egypt has seen in its 7000 years, or Iran for that matter. These convulsions are part of the historical tapestry. I hear some commentators describing the events in Egypt as ‘frightening’. Frightening for whom? Certainly not those on the streets who appear to be in a state of Dionysiac elation. It is all very well for Obama to make sanctimonious utterances about the loss of life but who would not sooner die for the cause of Freedom than be blown up on a remote Afghan pass for no reason at all.

One way to glimpse a different perspective on global affairs is to divide the age of nations by 100 and relate the resultant figure to human maturity. Thus Egypt would be around 70, China 50, Iran 30, most of Europe in the twenties, the US 3, and Israel not yet 1.

Keep your fingers crossed, we may at last be approaching a solution to the childish Palestine problem.

@Kassandra
Yes, the US foreign policy seems a lot like the policy regarding tobacco. On one hand spending lot's of money to make people stop smoking and on the other hand paying subsidies for Tobacco farming.

That's what I meant with the wording "completely nuts". It's like spending on democracy projects and at the same time sending the US AID not helping democracy, but repression.

I just found a picture of US aid send to Egypt:

http://yfrog.com/h7a0dvj

In the light of such pictures does anyone wonder, that some Egypts do not have very warm feelings for the democracy efforts of the USA? And this is just a small example.

The US made F15 regularly bombing Gaza and the A-10, Predators and Raptors doing the same in Afghanistan and Pakistan produce even worse pictures.

The deaths are sacrifices, the dead are martyrs, survivors grieve but they do so with pride and anger, the rest is sentimentality.

We will not see anything like US liberal democracy in the ME, rather perhaps something closer to the Russian system where broadly acceptable elections produce leaders who are largely left unhindered to pursue their policies provided they stay within very wide limits and don’t rock the boat too much. Such developments, whatever they are, will have to take account of the attitude of the people now on the streets when it comes to future relationships with Israel. The recent orchestrated demonisation of the Arab world, combined with support for ageing autocrats, has united factions that can be deadly to each other when opposed. The outcome could be a process of general disengagement from Israel, similar to Turkey’s, with a closing of embassies, and cessation of trade, security and other agreements but nothing to which the Israelis can respond with their arsenal.

The ball in the air, as I write, is the Egyptian army which is largely equipped and funded by the US and whose generals will surely have many close US contacts and may be bought. That would be unfortunate because it would send the wheel spinning through yet another cycle.

Yes, but war is not the only alternative to alliance and peaceful coexistence. Suppose the new regimes simply disengage from Israel, like Turkey but more so, cut off contact, have no trade or other agreements, deny use of airspace, etc. That combined with global attitudes might awaken the Israeli population, after all Ireland has just upgraded the Palestinian delegation in Dublin to the status of a mission.

The White House is doubtless concerned about these developments and has persuaded Mubarak to appoint Omar Soliman, who, it is hoped, may be able to swing the army, as VP, presumably with something like a promise to grant the old man sanctuary when and if the time comes. What odds on that working?

Turkey's route would be the most appealing. The position the army takes is going to be history-making. At least in the short run, it's the army who will be in charge and make the decisions. They've been happy recipients of the 1.5 Billion USD per year. This money has been spent on the Egyptian military with the specific aim of enforcing the Egypt-Israel peace treaty.

BUT, like much of Egyptians, I don't think there is much (understatement) affection for Israel within the army. Visit the Military Museum up on the Citadel. Overwhelmingly, the exhibits (life-size panoramas) glorify Egypt's successes in the 1973 war. I was the only foreigner there, but schoolchildren continuously trooped thru. Drive towards Port Said, military installation after installation is surrounded by high walls decorated with pictures and slogans from the 1973 war. As the Egyptian people have learned that they can confront Mubarak, it's very possible that something similar vs. Israel is lurking in the minds of the military. The news is reporting that the army is on the Sinai Peninsula, in Sharm al Sheik at least. The Peace Treaty declared the Sinai a demilitarized zone. Now, is the Army there with the understanding of Israel, or? Stay tuned.

Netanyahu does not necessarily equal Israel.

That is the significance of an actual democracy, that consistently undertakes an election regularly. He can be voted out of power.

Again, if the Palestine Papers were the only major event this week, then it would be plausible that the current right-wing coalition would be voted out.

I don't see uprising by any stretch occurring in Israel, so their rational response to unpredictable change is to lie low, and prepare to hunker down if necessary.

As the Egyptian demonstrations are more chaotic than organized (their basis of political movements), it is a realistic concern that the worst will prevail, rather than the democratic (in any meaning of the term that considers more relations than just the loudest).

These papers cover the Livni-Erekat talks, and you see the same evidence for tunnel-vision from the Olmert govt i.e. the Israeli govt of Olmert has its DOMESTIC concerns, and it is allowing those concerns to be paramount.

Ariel is the classic example: keeping Ariel makes no sense - none - if what you want to see is a viable, stable state of Palestine, yet Livni is willing to stonewall unless Abbas agrees to cede Ariel to Israel.

Why does she insist that Israel keep Ariel?

She tells you why, because she told Erekat why: the Israeli govt does not want to have to tell its public that *any* of the big settlements are to be abandoned, so it is letting that short-term problem stymie a long-term strategic need to ensure the viability of Palestine.

Indeed, if you read the papers you will see that it is the Palestinians who think strategically, because the Palestinians give far more weight to the long-term stability and viability of THEIR neighbour than Israel does towards a future Palestine.

You can see it when Abbas explains why there won't be millions of refugees returning to Israel i.e. it is not JUST because the Israelis insist that they won't go for it, but ALSO because he understands that such an influx of Arabs would cause Israel to convulse and, simply put, he has no desire to see Israel descend into secrtarian violence.

The Palestinians come across as FAR more professional than their Israeli counterparts, and that's true when the govt was headed by Barak, or by Olmert, or by Netanyahu.

Witty is a self designated "liberal" Zionist who would have us believe that all the Israeli failures and intransigence has been due to Likud. The Palestinian Papers explode that myth and reveal there is no daylight between LIkud and Kadima, but Witty cannot come to terms with that reality.

I disagree that the Palestinians necessarily come across as more professional so much as desperate. The fact that Fatah have reacted to angrily to the revelation of these papers suggests they were clutching at straws.

If you want to argue that the Pal negotiators were desperate to keep the details of their negotiations from the Palestinian public then you will get No Argument From Me.

But *IN* the negotiations their positions were thoroughly professional.

1) Jewish "neighbourhoods" in Jerusalem? Yeah, OK, so long as we get equal land IN or AROUND Jerusalem. Not Negev Desert. Not parched land alongside Gaza. Offer Like-for-Like and you can have 'em.

2) Har Homa? Forget it. Har Homa was *designed* to cut the West Bank off from Jerusalem. You. Can. Not. Have. It. No. Matter. What.

3) The settlement blocks? Yeah, those along the Green Line we're willing to swap for other land. Yeah, of course the guiding principle is Like-for-Like, do you think we're stupid.

4) Ariel and Ma’ale Adumin? No freekin' way, dudes. Both those stab INTO the West Bank, so there is no way we'll let you have them. Oh, yeah, and don't forget that aquifer under Ariel, because we haven't....

5) Right of return? Look, be sensible, Livni. We aren't asking the earth and the moon, but we also can't accept a pittance. The numbers must be in the 100,000s, but no more than that, and spread over 10 years. Be honest: if YOUR country can't absorb that many then there really is something seriously wrong with you guys.

Those are all thoroughly professional positions for the Palestinians to take, and I for one will not criticize them for it.

But the Israelis? Man, don't they put the "three no's of Khartoum" to shame.....

Did the Palestinians give away ALL of East Jerusalem?

The Pals are willing to concede all the "Jewish" settlements of East Jerusalem (what the Israelis call "Jewish neighbourhoods), but they demand that the exchange be
(a) 1 for 1 and
(b) like for like.

But not Har Homa.

They draw the line at Har Homa, and for good reasons i.e. it was
(a) established AFTER the Oslo Accords, and it was
(b) designed to cut off Jerusalem from the West Bank.

Those are sensible positions to take. Certainly more so that the Israeli position, which for all the world makes it look like Livni was channelling Daffy Duck i.e. "Mine! Mine! All mine!!!!"

While the ‘Palestine Papers’ are taken as truth to condemn Israel as a hard-hearted warmonger uninterested in peace, the whole affair can be summed up like this: The world is judging and condemning Israel on the basis of incomplete notes taken by Palestinian Authority junior staffers, many of whom are not fluent English-speakers (writing down statements made by people who are not native English speakers ) and who are passionate partisans of the Palestinian cause.

The documents have not been authenticated by anyone; they leave out the concessions made by Israel in the talks, and are filtered through the pro-Hamas, anti- Israel, anti-Palestinian Authority Al-Jazeera (whose record of reportage is marked by some amazing distortions and omissions) and the anti-Israel, Hamas-sympathetic, anti-PA Guardian.

They then misinterpret them in ways that seem deliberately intended to make Israel and the PA look bad, and they are quoted by journalists around the world who know little or nothing about the issues, haven’t read the documents, have never seriously considered the possibility that they aren’t 100 percent accurate, and ignore every other previous negotiation and public statement by Israel and the PA that contradict the claims being made, and who then add on even more claims that are neither in the documents nor in Al-Jazeera and The Guardian.

WHAT HISTORICAL information has been left out in this lynchmob atmosphere? To begin with, there have been Israel’s persistent offers of peace beginning with its 1948 Declaration of Independence and stretching over many years and through many initiatives.

There was the Egypt-Israel peace treaty of 1979, and the agreement offering Palestinians self-determination through elections.

There were the withdrawals from Sinai, southern Lebanon, large parts of the West Bank and all of the Gaza Strip.

There was also the 1993 agreement with the PLO, in which Israel froze the creation of any new settlements, allowed tens of thousands of Palestinians to come in, permitted the establishment of armed PA security groups (many of which turned their guns against it), supported the PA receiving aid and payments to it and made increasingly forthcoming offers of peace deals. This culminated in the 2000 Camp David meeting in which Yasser Arafat refused to negotiate on the basis of a two-state solution, down to prime minister Ehud Olmert’s offer that included even more concessions. As a result of these risks taken for peace, several thousand Israelis died at the hands of terrorists.

Also left out is the Israeli political context. At the time of the meetings in question, Olmert and former foreign minister Tzipi Livni were desperate. Their government was gradually collapsing, and they knew that only dramatic progress toward peace would save them. Never in the country’s history has a government been so strongly motivated to reach a deal, even at the cost of the most far-reaching concessions.

Why, then, would it just walk away after allegedly receiving such as generous Palestinian offer? Moreover, does it seem likely that Livni is, as presented in this coverage, a foe of international law and in favor of expelling Palestinian villagers from their homes? NOT A single statement – not only in public but in any private meeting that has ever surfaced – of PA leaders matches the positions they supposedly took in the meetings. It is hard for outsiders to imagine how passionately they hold to the demand for a “right of return” for all Palestinians who ever lived, or are descended from those who lived, on the pre-1948 territory of Israel.

Abbas has long been known to be personally dedicated to this point.

To claim that PA leaders dropped this demand without getting anything in return is to disregard the facts.

According to Olmert, what happened was that Abbas never endorsed the proposed deal or even responded to him after these discussions. In other words, it wasn’t Israel that rejected a deal but the PA. And, despite the spin put on it by the media, there is no evidence in the documents to the contrary.

Even the PA offer alleged in the documents only dealt with two of Israel’s concerns – the borders of east Jerusalem and the refugee issue – and not with ending the conflict, security guarantees or its recognition as a Jewish state (in exchange for recognizing Palestine as an Arab state).

EVENTS TODAY are starting to parallel the discourse of medieval anti-Jewish blood libels. Why? Because the fantastic nature of the unproven claims and the acceptance of some of the most fanatical haters of this people as sources has been no barrier to accusing Israelis of war crimes, of murdering children and of rejecting peace.

Indeed, this new version is worse than the blood libel, since in the traditional case the murders were done to fulfill an alleged religious obligation, while now they are supposedly committed just for fun or out of pure malice.

The old story being repeated is an eagerness to believe that the Jews are evil and criminal, even when logic and evidence show the accusations to be baseless.

That is anti-Semitism, whether it is expressed in terms of religion, race or – as it is today – national existence. And it is equally true whether expressed in the language of theological fanaticism, racist ravings or alleged concern for human rights while giving aid to the worst totalitarian forces.

FINALLY, I must say some kind words about the PA leaders and negotiators. I have often criticized them and pointed out that they will not and cannot (given their political context) make comprehensive peace with Israel. The Palestine Papers, even if true, prove that assertion. Either they were ready to make big concessions but could not deliver, since there would be a revolt once these became public, or they are innocent victims of pro-Hamas attacks.

Either way, they could never have delivered on such commitments.

Knowing this, they never would have made such offers; no one was more aware of that reality than they.

This group – Abbas, Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, Saeb Erakat and a few others – are moderates in the Palestinian context. Most of them may not be men of peace, but neither are they men of war.

They understand that decades more spent in struggle and bloodshed will not benefit their people.

They know what Arafat did to hurt the Palestinians and ensure that they did not get a state. They doubt their movement’s ability to wipe Israel off the map. They do not want a radical Islamist state, or thousands more people to die unnecessarily.

What we are seeing here, then, has been the bane of Arab politics since the 1930s: the triumph of radicals over moderates. The radical Arab nationalists wiped out the old moderate politicians and parliamentary regimes. The fate of moderates has repeatedly been assassination: the Palestinians Fakhri Nashashibi and Issam Sartawi, King Abdullah of Jordan, the Lebanese Riyad al-Sulh and Rafik Hariri, Egyptian Anwar Sadat and so many others.

Now, in an orgy of madness, the West has secured a revolutionary Islamist state in the Gaza Strip, stood by passively while Hizbullah seized control of Lebanon, and even cheered as concealed Islamists rule Turkey and chip away at freedom there. And these are the people who dare lecture Israel on the strategy it should follow? Equally, Western officials, intellectuals and journalists fail to realize that the Palestine Papers are the death knell for any peace process. What Palestinian leader would dare make the smallest concession now, or for many years to come? What Israeli leader will make big concessions or take risks, knowing how past ones only increased slanders, terrorism and the confidence of those who seek to commit genocide against this country? By empowering the extremists, showing hostility and unreliability to Israel and now helping to undercut the Palestinian moderates, Western democracies have made happen precisely the opposite of what they intended. Worst of all, they still don’t understand what damage they have brought on us all.

One can only hope they awaken before the entire Middle East is put into a nightmarish sleep.

The writer is director of the Global Research in International Affairs Center and editor of Middle East Review of International Affairs Journal and Turkish Studies. He blogs at www.rubinreports.blogspot.com.

I am afraid your ad hominem attacks don't work and are transparent. People see by attacking me personally you lack a cogent response.

I stated that the docs were notes, not intelligence. I stated that they were prepared by junior staff. I stated their content was filtered through the mediation of al Jazeera and the Guardian, not exactly paragons of journalistic ethics. These are cogent arguments. You are still making nonsensical personal attacks. So, you are still the Pot!

Why don't you do your own thinking rather than allow Barry Rubin to do your thinking for you?

Because, when it's all said and done, Rubin is saying that he doesn't believe what's in the Palestinians Papers because he DOESN'T WANT TO believe what he is reading.

It's called "cognitive dissonance", I believe.....

"I am afraid your ad hominem attacks don't work and are transparent. People see by attacking me personally you lack a cogent response."

Except not one word of your original post was your own.

Not. One. Word.

So sorry, but that fact alone makes it entirely reasonable to point out that you are nothing more than a mouthpiece for Other People's Propaganda.

Think about it: complaining about "ad-hominem attacks" is a complaint that they are "attacking me personally, not my arguments!", and that carries no weight if you aren't actually making your own arguments.

After all, complaining that "they are attacking me personally because I am Barry Rubin's puppet!" doesn't quite have the same gravitas, does it?