Marcy just posted this brief on the latest evidence that all is not cookies and coffee between the Obama and Netanyahu administrations:
JERUSALEM (JTA) — The White House expressed dismay over the approval of the construction of 900 housing units in an eastern Jerusalem neighborhood.
The Jerusalem muncipal planning committee approved the plan for four- to five-bedroom apartments iabutting Gilo on Tuesday, just hours after an Israeli newspaper published an article reporting that the Obama administration objected to the community’s expansion.
"We are dismayed at the Jerusalem Planning Committee’s decision to move forward on the approval process for the expansion of Gilo in Jerusalem," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said Tuesday afternoon. "At a time when we are working to re-launch negotiations, these actions make it more difficult for our efforts to succeed. Neither party should engage in efforts or take actions that could unilaterally pre-empt, or appear to pre-empt, negotiations.
"The U.S. also objects to other Israeli practices in Jerusalem related to housing, including the continuing pattern of evictions and demolitions of Palestinian homes. Our position is clear: the status of Jerusalem is a permanent status issue that must be resolved through negotiations between the parties."
Gilo, which is located over the Green Line, has a population of more than 40,000. The new development, called "Gilo’s western slopes," is designed to attract more well-off residents, Ha’aretz reported.
On Monday, special U.S. Middle East envoy George Mitchell, in a meeting in London with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s aide Yitzhak Molcho, asked Israel to stop building in Gilo, according to Yediot Achronot. The newspaper said Molcho rejected the request.
"This is related to a routine procedure of the regional planning committee to approve construction in the Gilo neighborhood of Jerusalem," officials in Netanyahu’s office reportedly told Yediot. "The Gilo neighborhood is an integral part of Jerusalem, in the same way that the Ramat Eshkol, Rehavia, French Hill, and Pisgat Zeev neighborhoods are part of the united city, and there is no difference between construction in these neighborhoods of Jerusalem and construction in Tel Aviv or Haifa."
The brief includes the entirety of the White House statement.
First out of the box with a statement is Americans for Peace Now, via their spokesman, Ori Nir:
By approving plans for wide scale construction in East Jerusalem, Prime Minister Netanyahu is undermining the prospects for the very negotiations that he claims he wants. Construction in the West Bank and East Jerusalem sends a message to the world and to Israel’s Palestinian partner that the Israeli government is not interested in holding peace negotiations in earnest.
Relatedly, Jerusalem mayor Nir Barkat protested earlier this month about a lack of communication from the Obama administration. But actions talk louder than words — so who here’s at fault?
UPDATE: Answering my question before I even asked it, APN says in an analysis that Bibi’s at fault:
The Gilo plan is thus extremely provocative on several levels. It represents a clear and public statement from the Netanyahu government that it is neither "freezing" nor acting with "restraint" in East Jerusalem. It compels the Palestinians to respond, just as it compels other regional actors to respond. Finally, it has important strategic implications, since the plan, implemented, would impact on border options for Jerusalem under a future peace agreement.
Today’s crisis was by no means inevitable. Nobody (except for those of us who obsessively follow Jerusalem at its most minute level) had any idea this Gilo plan was on the agenda for today. This means that Bibi could easily have responded positively to US concerns and quietly quashed or delayed the project, without any political cost. Alternatively, he could have offered another (deceptively) constructive course, like allowing it to be deposited for public review but promising to find other ways to hold it up later. Or he could simply have refused to intervene, but kept quiet about it – letting today’s technical approval process run it course and only react publicly, after the fact.
Bibi had a number of conventional options; he chose to go nuclear.
LATER UPDATE: And Now, the Orthodox Union weighs in:
Today, The White House issued a statement expressing its "dismay" at the decision by the City of Jerusalem Planning Committee to approve the construction of new housing units in the south Jerusalem neighborhood of Gilo.
The Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations, through its director of public policy Nathan Diament, issued the following statement:
On matters regarding Jerusalem, the position of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America, is clear – Jerusalem is the eternal and indivisible capital of Israel and the Jewish people.
In this context, it is also worth noting that that is the official policy of the United States as articulated in a duly enacted Act of Congress which states:(a)Statement of the Policy of the United States.—
(1)Jerusalem should remain an undivided city in which the rights of every ethnic and religious group are protected;
(2)Jerusalem should be recognized as the capital of the State of Israel”
While we appreciate the efforts by the Obama Administration to delicately manuever the Israelis and Palestinians back the the negotiating table, it is the Palestinians who are proposing the radical step of bypassing those negotiations and unilaterally acting, while this approval of additional construction in a built up section of southern Jerusalem is not a radical move.
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