The ball is now in the court of the international actors and Israel, who have to decide whether this formulation marks a move toward acceptance of the Quartet’s conditions and allows them to begin to work with the new Palestinian government and remove the sanctions or whether it simply falls too far short of their demands and therefore obliges them to persist in their pressure.
The indications are that a split will develop over this question between the United and Israel, on one side, and the European Union and Russia, on the other. The former will probably maintain a more rigid position while the Europeans will claim – and this is already the declared position of Russia – that the Mecca Agreement constitutes the beginning of a process of moderation in Hamas’ posture that should be encouraged by working with the new government and easing the sanctions.
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In-Depth Coverage
Original Commentaries
- 08/07/08
- How to Deal with Jerusalem —Lt. Col. (Res.) Ron Shatzberg, Project Director, Economic Cooperation Foundation. Interview with Middle East Bulletin.
- 08/07/08
- How to Deal with Jerusalem —
- 08/05/08
- Why Did Maliki Call for a Timeline? —by Christopher Kojm who teaches at the Elliott School of International Affairs at George Washington University and is a former senior advisor to the Iraq Study Group. Original Commentary for Middle East Bulletin.
Setting the Record Straight
Already Divided
“Even the Arab minority in the city has shown its preference for living under Israeli rule, as many have moved to the Israeli side of the security barrier being built around Jerusalem. Their choice is reasonable, as Jerusalem offers the quality of life of a modern western city while only a few kilometers away the norm is a third world standard of living, chaos and religious intolerance. An undivided Jerusalem is the best guarantee of a better life for all Jerusalemites.”—Nathan Diament, Director of Public Policy, Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America, July 23, 2008
—Moshe Arens, former Israeli defense and foreign minister (Likud), “A Story of Neglect,” Haaretz, July 28, 2008
Middle East Analysis
- Israel Releases 199 Palestinian Prisoners —
- Significant Lebanese-Syrian Meeting Overshadowed by Bombing —
- The Challenge of Jerusalem —Prof. Yaacov Bar-Siman-Tov, head, Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies; professor of international relations, Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Interview with Middle East Bulletin.
February 22, 2007