Dr. Ramzy Baroud, a US-Arab journalist who’s been editor of Palestine Chronicle since 1999, on Thursday published an op-ed piece calling the Trump shift in US attitude regarding the Israeli dispute with the Palestinian Authority and the two-state solution a blessing in disguise.
“Unmistakably, a Donald Trump presidency is clearly terrible for Palestinians in the short term,” Baroud writes. “The man does not even attempt to show a degree of impartiality or an iota of balance as he approaches the Middle East’s most protracted and delicate conflict.”
However, in Baroud’s opinion, the fact that Trump is clear and unabashed about his bias in favor of Israel would finally discard the perpetual US ambiguity about Israel and the Arabs in the territories it liberated in 1967.
“Since mid-level US officials agreed to meet with a Palestine Liberation Organization delegation in Tunisia in the late 1980’s, the US has chosen a most bewildering path of peace-making,” he argues, complaining that “the White House set the parameters of the ‘peace process,’ corralled Arabs on many occasions to have them rubber-stamp whatever peace ‘vision’ the US found suitable, and divided the Arabs into ‘moderates’ and ‘radicals’ camps, solely based on how a certain country would perceive US dictates of ‘peace’ in the region.”
According to Baroud, The US did not have a mandate to declare itself “honest peace broker,” especially when, in his view, it has done “everything wrong to jeopardize the accomplishment of the very parameters that it set to achieve the supposed peace.”
On the one hand, he points out, the US called Israel’s settlement enterprise an “obstacle to peace,” while on the other hand it provides Israel with the funds it requires to help Jewish communities thrive in Judea and Samaria. The US, even under President Obama, called for “confidence building measures,” while increasing its military aid to Israel and supporting its actions during the Gaza wars and in repelling terrorism in Judea and Samaria and Jerusalem.
“In other words,” Baroud points out, “for decades, the US has done precisely the exact opposite of what it publicly preached.”
“But that era is, indeed, over,” he rejoices, since, at last, “a Trump Presidency is likely to witness a complete departure from the Washingtonian doublespeak. […] In fact, Trump is set to expose American foreign policy for what it truly is, and has been for decades.”
Of course, with the White House becoming more pro-Israel than many Israeli politicians, “the Palestinians, too, will have to make a choice, face the decades-long reality with a united front, or side with those who intend to ‘reset’ the future [by their] interpretation of biblical prophecies.”
This line of thinking should go a long way to improve the region’s chances for a modicum of relief, never mind the illusive peace. As any beginner therapist would tell you, the first step toward recovery is admitting you have a problem.