A lot of water has flowed down New York's Hudson River since Israel's first prime minister, David Ben Gurion, famously brushed off the U.N. in 1955 with the words Um Shmum, perhaps best translated as U.N. Poo-En. Forty years later, then U.N. Secretary-General Koffi Anan reacted to those words during a visit to Israel, saying, Um Shmum, perhaps, but without us you wouldn't have anything. This week, members of the Prime Minister's Office wandered through the U.N. corridors telling TV crews: Um Shmum, but without us the Palestinians won't have a state. U.S. President Barack Obama's warm speech at the General Assembly on Wednesday, from Israel's point of view, made it clear that the battle had been won: A Palestinian state would result from their living next to Israel in peace and a written agreement between the two sides, Obama said, not by force, like arm-wrestling. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' greatest accomplishment was in dragging Israel to an arena where the Palestinian leader is comfortable. It's an arena where he has majority support, and where the U.S.'s role as a player is smaller than in the Middle East. Abbas made us sweat, but in terms of the result, he lost. He tested the Americans' limit and found that a roaring lion is apparently angry. His original plan was to appeal to the Security Council, with the hope of getting nine states to support him and force the U.S. to impose its veto against the recognition of a Palestinian state. He'd take that refusal and go to the General Assembly and gain state or observer status there. Even a day earlier, as these words are being written, the Palestinians' next move was shrouded in mystery. It may turn out that all they remember from this week at the U.N. is the speech the Palestinian president gives before the General Assembly today. Obama's current term in office and his attitude towards Israel can be measured mainly by his speeches. The first speech was in Cairo when Obama, America's great hope, sought to bring about a new Middle East and open a new chapter in the West's relations with the Arab world. The American president embraced the Muslim world. This past May we had the speech in which Obama first mentioned the 1967 borders as a basis for those of a future Palestinian state. The direct confrontation with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who made it clear that Israel would not accept such borders, led to the speech full of clarifications which he gave before the Jewish-American lobbyists at the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee. Obama mentioned the Jewish state there and said the future borders would be based on the 1967 lines, but that both sides would consider some alterations, meaning both the settlement blocs in Judea and Samaria and the matter of Jerusalem. This week we heard the fourth speech, which was 100 percent pro-Israel. It took two and a half years, but in the end Obama took a side and confirmed his belief that the Netanyahu government's approach to the conflict is correct. The truth is sinking in, was Netanyahu's first remark when he heard Obama in New York. The Prime Minister's Office had two explanations for the pro-Israel speech: The first is the Arab Spring which until now has turned out to be an adventure that leaves behind countries in chaos. Egypt, which was Washington's ally, is now missing any kind of stable government. Obama creates order The overthrowing of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak rattled the palaces of Saudi Arabia and Jordan, and was analyzed closely by Teheran and Damascus as well. The general line that Israel advocated -- that the problem in the Middle East was not the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but the presence of tyrannical, dangerous regimes, topped by Iran -- was well-received. The second reason for Obama's changing his views, apparently, is the body blow he took in congressional special elections in New York, where Republican Bob Turner won in the 9th District, always considered Jewish and Democratic. The administration realized that the election defeat was directly tied to its relations with Netanyahu. The result was not just Obama's supportive speech, but also what wasn't mentioned: the occupation, 1967 lines and an end to Palestinian suffering customary in the president's past speeches and declarations. Abbas planned to meet with Obama this Sunday. The plan was that after the Security Council session, he could still squeeze something out of that process in the U.N., and also get something out of the Americans. Israel acted to undermine the move, and suggested moving the meeting up to Wednesday, after the meeting with Netanyahu. If the Palestinian Authority leader wanted to embarrass the U.S. president by forcing him to use his veto for Israel's sake and make Obama look bad in the Arab world, why not put Abbas in the corner, and demand answers even before the Palestinians made their move? The Americans agreed to this and signs of pressure they put on the Palestinians could be seen in the Palestinians' vacillation about what they planned to do next. The public remarks made by Obama at the start of his meeting with Netanyahu only complemented what the president said in the General Assembly remarks: The bonds between the United States and Israel are unbreakable, and the United States commitment to Israels security is unbreakable. Indeed, I think its fair to say that today our security cooperation is stronger than it has ever been. Im looking forward to a good discussion with Prime Minister Netanyahu about the events not only here in the United Nations, but also of the developments that have been taking place in the region. As I just indicated, peace cannot be imposed on the parties. Its going to have to be negotiated. One-sided declarations in the United Nations will achieve neither statehood nor self-determination for the Palestinians, but Israelis and Palestinians sitting down together and working through these very difficult issues that have kept the parties apart for decades now
the ultimate goal of all of us, which is two states, side by side, living in peace and security. Recent events in the region remind us of how fragile peace can be. Obama set everything straight, explained Cabinet Secretary Zvi Hauser while Obama and Netanyahu had their meeting in one of the U.N. halls. The Security Council determines reality. In the General Assembly they talk about reality. A Palestinian state is the product of an agreement, not a situation. What appeared like it was going to be a clear achievement by the Palestinians -- changed. Reality trumps both imagination and analysis. They spoke about a state, and that's an achievement that has still eluded them, he said. Abbas is not ready Without an agreement there's fear that on the ground this will be translated into frustration and as a result, escalating violence. Or as National Infrastructure Minister Uzi Landau says, They won't get a state out of it, but there will be harsh and serious results. In 1947, the U.N. decision became the foundation for the legitimacy of the creation of the state of Israel. Then came the War of Independence, which determined facts on the ground. Here too, the greatest fear in Israel and the U.S. is that someone on the ground will want war. Non-violent demonstrations in the Jerusalem vicinity which become violent, or Friday prayers at the Al-Aqsa mosque on the Temple Mount that get out of control could be the match needed to ignite trouble. That's why developments on the ground today are critical, because that's when both Abbas and Netanyahu will address the General Assembly. The prime minister planned to declare in his speech that the world is changing, including the Arab world, and that these transformations must be taken into account when people demand a solution in the Middle East. Israel is a small country surrounded by enemies, and under missile attack. We support a Palestinian state, he'll say, but it will only be established through negotiations: Sitting down and talking out of a desire to reach a conclusion, Netanyahu will say. Today, he believes, Abbas is still not ready to reach a peace agreement with Israel. Peace means his making painful concessions: conceding the right of return of refugees and understanding that there is no room for another Palestinian state made up of Israeli Arabs. That is what recognizing the Jewish state means. If such Palestinian recognition is achieved, there will be an agreement, he'll say. However, Abbas is presenting preconditions. He wants two things: a freeze on building in the settlements during the talks and an Israeli undertaking to present a map of the borders of a future Palestinian state. Lieberman lashes out Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman explained this week at the U.N. that his red lines are clear. He opposes another freeze on building in the settlements, which most of the members of the Political-Security Cabinet support, saying a freeze will not happen not even for a day or an hour. The prime minister agrees with this, mainly because he believes it wouldn't serve any purpose. There already was a 10-month freeze and it exposed a tactical attempt by Abbas to cause an internal split in Israel and determine facts on the ground, without leading to any progress in the peace talks. I'll speak about the truth, Netanyahu declared at the beginning of the week. On his way to New York, the prime minister got an answer to a key question: Is his truth on a collision course with the truth of the Americans and the Europeans? Now it's clear that everyone seems to understand that there's a need to push for some progress from Ramallah. Netanyahu was asked this week what the goal of his U.N. speech is and he explained that it's to provide information to the world. The opposition argued that this wasn't an issue of information, but one of policy, stemming from a lack of leadership. But it also knows that the government's policy was already set some two months ago when Israel agreed with the Quartet proposal that if there is a partner ready to make decisions, Israel will be prepared to make painful compromises. But when we talk about leadership, it's clear that on the Palestinian side, it only exists for conflict. Netanyahu also underwent a change, but it came already with his speech at Bar-Ilan University in 2009. That's when he made clear he favored creation of a Palestinian state, but that it had to be a country which would live in peace alongside Israel without hostilities, as part of his well-known staged plan for creating such a state. And this week another sentence was added to the formula: There are no short cuts for the necessary Palestinian understandings. The road to success also includes Palestinian concessions, and without it there will be no progress. It seemed like Netanyahu was back at his old job this week, a diplomat in the U.N. corridors. Between meetings with friendly leaders like the U.S. president and Canadian Prime Minister Steve Harper, he has also been seeing representatives of countries that could make a difference in the vote: Colombia and Gabon. There were countries which agreed with our line out of moral reasons, but there were also countries that asked what was in it for them, Lieberman admitted this week. The Yisrael Beitenu leader took the opportunity to attack Defense Minister Ehud Barak for what he said was a mistake in which the defense minister ran and told the guys that Nigeria was on our side in the Security Council vote. Lieberman clearly hinted to the press that it was his level-headedness that led to success in the diplomatic battles at the U.N. This didn't happen by chance, he said, the peace of mind and the ability to stand up to pressure is an important part of the story. There were those in the Likud who saw a sub-text about elections in his words. Fighting for credit is not like Lieberman, there's something deeper here, a Likud MK who followed things from Israel said. Lieberman took the opportunity to also publicly rebuke his deputy minister, Danny Ayalon, for briefing journalists in Lieberman's name. That led to a headline about threats to the Palestinians if they succeeded at the U.N. which Lieberman supposedly voiced and conditions he was supposedly trying to set: If the Palestinians weren't punished for their U.N. antics, he would quit the coalition. It looked like a Lieberman threat forcing Netanyahu to choose between him or Obama. It's possible that's what that headline was trying to get across, political advisers believe. But Lieberman denied the story and rebuked Ayalon. Lieberman is aware of the rumors that he plans on seeking elections already during the Knesset's upcoming winter session. He was doing this out of his own personal considerations, some say. But Lieberman himself decided to put a halt to those rumors and again stressed he has no plan to break up the government anytime soon.
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