I've watched with frustration over the last few weeks the back and forth and feigned outrage about what Obama said and didn't say regarding the Israeli-Palestinian "peace process". For the most part, the right's claims are completely disingenuous. All Obama did was break the rules. All he did was say in public what everyone agrees in private. And the only reason he did it is because for 10 years now there has been an impasse and a lack of courage on both sides.
You can blame Abbas and Hamas. Or Olmert and Netanyahu. In the end, everyone has failed and a decade has been been wasted. The problem is no one has the balls to break the rules, to shift the paradigm, as they say.
In 1977, Egyptian President Answar Sadat broke the rules. I have no doubt that those on the Egyptian right back then advised him against visiting Jerusalem. "Fuck the Israelis," they must have said. "Let Begin come to Cairo. Let the Jews bend. Let them give us back Sinai and then we'll talk. Maybe." Sadat shifted the paradigm and Egypt became the first Arab country to make peace with Israel.
Sadat went to Jerusalem. Nixon went to China. Netanyahu? He went into that lion's den of seething Israel haters: the United States Congress. What courage that must have taken.
Sometimes, while everyone is sitting around arguing about how to make CDs better, someone comes along with iPods and iTunes and breaks the rules. That's what's needed here. Because the rules as they stand stink.
Peace in the Middle East needs more Obamas right now, not fewer.
You might enjoy Clayton Christenson's The Innovator's Dilemma. Sometimes people will settle for an inferior product when it is the best alternative to nothing at all.
http://www.amazon.com/Innovators-Dilemma-Revolutionary-Business-Essentials/dp/0060521996/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1306856920&sr=1-1
Posted by: trevor | 31 May 2011 at 11:49 AM