Palestinian Unity Deal Shouldn't Preclude American Action On Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

In terms of domestic politics, it doesn't really make sense for Barack Obama to tackle the Israeli-Palestinian conflict right now. Many members of his political coalition have fairly profound disagreements on this subject, so ducking the issue is appealing. Under the circumstances, it might feel good to hit upon excuses to paper over underlying disagreements and this reporting from Mark Landler and Helene Cooper makes it seem like that's what's happening inside the White House:

Mr. Obama had considered laying out American parameters for a peace deal, several officials said — a move that Mrs. Clinton favored, but one that would have put him at odds with his national security adviser, Thomas E. Donilon, and his top Middle East adviser, Dennis Ross.

But the unity accord between Hamas and Fatah, the party of President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority, effectively killed the plans to try to push through an American proposal, one administration official said. "It's hard to imagine how we do that when Hamas hasn't agreed" to recognize Israel's right to exist and to forswear violence against Israel, the official said.

That doesn't make very much sense to me. Benjamin Netanyahu's political coalition includes people who don't recognize Palestine's "right to exist" and no Zionist political party has agreed to forswear violence against Palestinians. If a Palestinian tries to drive on a Jews-only road or enter the security perimeter of a settlement or walk in the "no Arabs allowed" portion of Hebron he'll be removed. By force. That's what the occupation is. Lack of mutual diplomatic recognition and lack of commitment to resolve disputes peacefully is what the conflict consists of. You don't agree to everything and then have a peace deal. You achieve peace by reaching the deal.

In other news, here's Brian Katulis on the big picture.