P.J. and Nir, or, Stirah, ata rotzeh?

Nir Barkat, Jerusalem’s busy mayor, made headlines this week when he described Obama administration demands that Israel freeze Jerusalem building as a "slap in the face."

I lived in Jerusalem for 15 years. The Obama administration’s reaction — the whole exchange — reminds me of one of those unfortunate conversations one hears in the shuk, in the playground, on crowded buses during dry, insistent sharavs (desert winds):

A: You want a slap?

B: Slap? I’ll give you slap.

A: Slap? You don’t know what a slap is.

B: I’ll show you what I know about slaps.

C: I’ll slap both of you in a second.

Etc.

Anyway, here’s P.J. Crowley, the State Department spokesman, aka "Mamush miPatt," yesterday:

We have our own issues in this country where occasionally cities or states delve into foreign policy areas.

Full exchange after the jump.

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QUESTION: Okay. Well, the reason I’m asking the East Jerusalem question is because the mayor of Jerusalem last night had some pretty provocative comments about what his local – you know, what the municipal position on this. And what he said was that regardless – well, it was basically that he doesn’t really care if it has any effect on the peace process, there will not be any freeze or de facto or otherwise, and that this kind of construction is going to continue regardless of whether it interferes or hurts your attempts to get the proximity talks started. The other thing he said was that there was no way – repeated his position – that there was no way that Jerusalem would ever be divided.

And I’m just wondering what you make of these remarks in light – are they helpful in light of where you are trying to get the two sides?

MR. CROWLEY: Well, look, we have our own issues in this country where occasionally cities or states delve into foreign policy areas.

QUESTION: Well, here’s the thing, he doesn’t regard this as a foreign policy —

MR. CROWLEY: Well, Matt, hang on a second. Let me – and there’s a conversation between the federal government and state and local governments over the provinces of federal action versus local action. In this case, as well, notwithstanding what they may or may not think, to the extent that there are issues that have broader implications, this is an area that really is between the Israeli national government and the mayor of Jerusalem. I’m not going to intercede in the middle of that relationship.

As the Vice President and the Secretary have made clear, we think that the parties have special responsibilities not to take unilateral actions that complicate – they should take actions that promote negotiations. They should not take actions that complicate negotiations. That is our position. As to how that applies to the actions of the mayor, I’ll leave that to the Israelis.

QUESTION: Well, but do you regard his comments as a complicating factor?

MR. CROWLEY: Well, I would just simply say that Israel and Israeli citizens have special responsibility as the Palestinian Authority and Palestinian people have special responsibilities. That would include the mayor of Israel – the mayor of Jerusalem.

QUESTION: Well, that’s – right, but that’s not my question. My question is: Does this complicate your attempts to get the proximity talks started?

MR. CROWLEY: I’m not going to comment on the mayor’s specific comments. Obviously, this issue involving actions on the ground have the potential to complicate proximity talks that we hope will lead to direct negotiations. We’ve made that clear that unilateral actions, whether made at the governmental level or made at the citizen level, have an impact. People need to evaluate and take that into account before they take such actions.

But these are matters that we remain in regular, if not daily, contact with the parties on, and we are – continue to work with them as we have in terms of the Secretary’s meeting with Minister Barak. Deputy Secretary Steinberg also had a meeting yesterday with Deputy Foreign Minister Ayalon. And we are working this intensively and hope to see the parties back into proximity talks very soon.

QUESTION: Right. Well, I’ll tell you, I’ll just drop it after this, but I’m just a little confused, because when the initial announcement was made that caused so much problems last – caused all these problems last month, there was no – you weren’t shy about talking about announcements or comments. The Secretary got on the phone with Netanyahu and complained rather vociferously about this, as did you from this podium, and as did White House officials after that.

So why now is it that you don’t want to talk about what – or you don’t want to say —

MR. CROWLEY: Well, let me separate —

QUESTION: You don’t want to give us your impression of what these comments —

MR. CROWLEY: Let me separate the two issues, okay? On comments by the mayor of Jerusalem, I will simply repeat what the Vice President said: that the parties have special responsibilities to do things that promote negotiation and not do things that complicate negotiation. But our – on the specific issue of actions on the ground, we have been very clear that Jerusalem is a final status issue and the only place in which that can be resolved is through direct negotiations, and no attempts should be made to change or complicate the facts on the ground before the parties can get into direct negotiations.

QUESTION: So do you —

MR. CROWLEY: On that score, we’ve been very clear.

QUESTION: So you —

MR. CROWLEY: I’m not going to talk about —

QUESTION: All right, all right. You think the mayor is irrelevant here?

MR. CROWLEY: I’m just – as to what the mayor says and how that relates to Israeli policies, I’ll leave that to Israeli politics. As to our view of Jerusalem, we’ve been clear over a number of years that Jerusalem was a final status issue and that the parties writ large, and that includes at high and low levels of government, they should avoid provocative and unilateral steps that complicate getting the parties into negotiations, which is the only route to resolve this once and for all.