According to the leak, Obama made a series of extraordinarily generous offers to Israel, many of them at the expense of the Palestinians, in return for a single minor concession from Netanyahu: a two-month extension of the partial freeze on settlement growth.
A previous 10-month freeze, which ended a week ago, has not so far been renewed by Netanyahu, threatening to bring the negotiations to an abrupt halt. The Palestinians are expected to decide whether to quit the talks over the coming days.
Netanyahu was reported last week to have declined the US offer.
The
White House has denied that a letter was sent, but, according to the
Israeli media, officials in Washington are privately incensed by
Netanyahu's rejection.
The letter's contents have also been partly confirmed by Jewish US senators who attended a briefing last week from Ross.
According to Makovsky, in return for the 60-day settlement moratorium, the US promised to veto any UN Security Council proposal on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict over the next year, and committed to not seek any further extensions of the freeze. The future of the settlements would be addressed only in a final agreement.
The White House would also allow Israel to keep a military presence in the West Bank's Jordan Valley, even after the creation of a Palestinian state; continue controlling the borders of the Palestinian territories to prevent smuggling; provide Israel with enhanced weapons systems, security guarantees and increase its billions of dollars in annual aid; and create a regional security pact against Iran.
There are several conclusions the Palestinian leadership is certain to draw from this attempt at deal-making over its head.
The first is that the US president, much like his predecessors, is in no position to act as an honest broker. His interests in the negotiations largely coincide with Israel's.
Obama needs a short renewal of the freeze, and the semblance of continuing Israeli and Palestinian participation in the "peace process", until the US Congressional elections in November.
Criticism by the powerful pro-Israel lobby in Washington may damage Obama's Democratic Party unless he treads a very thin line. He needs to create the impression of progress in the Middle East talks but not upset Israel's supporters by making too many demands on Netanyahu.
The second conclusion already strongly suspected by Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, and his advisers is that Netanyahu, despite his professed desire to establish a Palestinian state, is being insincere.
The White House's private offer meets most of Netanyahu's demands for US security and diplomatic assistance even before the negotiations have produced tangible results. For Netanyahu to reject the offer so lightly, even though the US was expecting relatively little in return, suggests he is either in no mood or in no position to make real concessions to the Palestinians on statehood.
The Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz reported on 1 October that senior White House officials were no longer "buying the excuse of politicial difficulties" for Netanyahu in holding his right-wing governing coalition together. If he cannot keep his partners on board over a short freeze on illegal settlement building, what meaningful permanent concessions can he make in the talks?
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